


If you're my soulmate, what the FUCK is wrong with my soul?

by PoisonedPen



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Bisexual Lance (Voltron), Bullying, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Hurt Keith (Voltron), Hurt Lance (Voltron), Hurt No Comfort, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Injured Lance (Voltron), Keith (Voltron) is Bad at Feelings, Keith (Voltron) is a Mess, Keith (Voltron)-centric, Lance (Voltron) is Bad at Feelings, Lance (Voltron) is a Mess, Lance (Voltron)-centric, Langst, M/M, Pain, Protective Keith (Voltron), Protective Lance (Voltron), Soulmates, Torture, comfort comes later, disgusting overuse of italics, for now, for now we suffer, klance, klangst, of eMOTION, they're both fucking useless, this is a fucking rollercoaster
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-01
Updated: 2018-12-13
Packaged: 2019-05-31 17:38:44
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 10
Words: 51,028
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15124532
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PoisonedPen/pseuds/PoisonedPen
Summary: Lance was seven the first time his mama told him about soulmates. How you can take your soulmate's pain from them and they can take yours. On that day, Lance swore his soulmate would never have to suffer and from then on insisted on taking their every injury from them. He dutifully ignored the fact that they'd never once taken away his pain. They must have had a reason...Keith was seven the first time he heard about soulmates. He thought it was a load of bullshit. Why the hell would someone you've never met want to take away your pain? How could he accept someone only caring about him because they were soulmates? Out of principle, he refused to ever take away his soulmate's pain.Whoever thought the two would later meet in space and be more than a little pissed off at each other?





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hey, hope you enjoy this self-gratuitous piece of angst I made.  
> A/N- I know Lance is Cuban and wanted to incorporate that into the story but I didn't fail Spanish GCSE for nothing and I do not want to cause any offense. Therefore, Spanish is written in italics along with a couple of Spanish words I can remember.  
> Enjoy x

Lance was seven the first time his mama told him about soulmates. He’d scrambled into the kitchen, rubbing his arm and claiming,

“Mama, something is wrong!” His mother turned to face him, flour up to her elbows,

“Lance, mijo, what’s the matter?” The Spanish was soothing and familiar enough to calm Lance down.

“My leg. It hurts really badly but I didn’t do anything to it.” Mrs McClain was silent for several long seconds before she wiped her hands on her apron and crouched downwards, so that the two of them were eye level.

“ _Pollito,_  that was your soulmate.” Lance blinked up in confusion and cocked his head, questioningly. Mrs McClain huffed a laugh and tried again.

“Did the pain start all at once?” Lance considered this question for a few seconds then shook his head.

“No, it was coming from someone else first.” After saying this his face screwed up, unhappy with his choice of words,

“I mean, it wasn’t my pain. I took it.” He stopped again, frustrated with his inability to explain the situation. Angry tears filled his eyes, only to be brushed away gently by his mama. She gave him a fond smile,

“It’s okay. I know it’s hard to explain, but _that_ Lance, was your soulmate’s pain.”

 

Lance furrowed his brow,

“Soulmate? What’s that?” Mrs McClain smiled,

“It’s someone extremely important to you. Maybe more so than anyone else in the universe. Someone that understands you and your pain. You’re other half.” Lance beamed,

“Like you and Papa!” The laughter faded slightly from his mama’s face, replaced with a residual pain.

“No Lance, although we loved each other very much, we weren’t soulmates. It doesn’t always work like that. You know Luciana?”

“Abuelita Luciana?”

“Yes. I’ve known her since I was your age and she’s my soulmate.” Lance pondered this new piece of information.

“Do you love her?”

“Yes, I love her very much.”

“So you can feel her pain too?”

“Yes, and I can also take it away.” Lance’s eyes widened in wonder.

“So they would never get hurt and never get upset?” Mrs McClain affirmed this and a look of determination settled itself on Lance’s young face.

“Then I’m going to do that!” He stuck his arms our wide and flashed a grin, spinning on the spot and favouring his uninjured leg.

“I‘m going to take away my soulmate’s pain so they never have to feel it.” Mrs McClain’s head snapped towards her son.

“You will do no such thing!” Lance set his jaw stubbornly,

“Yes I will and it’s _my_  soulmate so you can’t tell me what to do.” Mrs McClain swelled in anger and opened her mouth to retort.-

Looking back, Lance couldn’t remember the exact words she'd said to him. Nor could he remember what he'd said back to her. He was seven. It was understandable. It didn’t really matter anyway, as the arguments following that day were just repeats and remixes of what had been established back then. Yet, regardless of what was said or promised, from that moment on, Lance took every injury his soulmate gained, from the tiniest papercut to things that got him into a lot more trouble.

 

The wounds began small. Just the typical scrapes and bruises expected from a young child. In fact, it was so typical that Lance’s mama didn't even realise at first. His extra injuries flew under her radar as she faced the more pressing concerns of Maria’s grades and Alejandro’s football practice and whether she would ever be able to tell the twins apart. As a result, it wasn’t until Lance was fourteen that she even remembered the argument they had had regarding his soulmate.

 

Lance, on the other hand, had not forgotten. Ever since that day, every time he felt the echo of his soulmate’s pain, he pulled it onto himself and suffered the consequences. It was a strange feeling, knowing that someone else was in pain. Like watching the waves from beneath the ocean’s surface. It was like _he knew_ his soulmate was in pain but until he brought it onto himself he had no clue as to how much. This led to some dangerous experimentation, as it was only through trial and error that Lance began to be able to predict the amount of pain he was taking on. On a surface level, it didn’t matter. He took it regardless. Yet it worked to his advantage if he was able to prepare himself for whatever level of suffering he was about to endure.

 

After a year or so he became pretty good at reading it. It was kind of like a phantom pain. Pushing down on his body but causing no harm until he pulled it out of the spirit realm. Clinging to him like spider silk, wrapping its way around his body and just waiting for him to reel it in.

 

 

 

The taking of these small-scale injuries peaked around the same time Lance’s family moved from their hometown in Cuba, to America. Lance and his siblings had protested the move but his mama had been adamant. She’d been given a promotion by the company she worked for and therefore supplied both a raise and a new house, so that she could work in its main office. Now, Lance was incredibly proud of her but Cuba was his home. This was where his house and friends and Varadero beach was. There wouldn’t be anything like that in America. But the promotion was a necessity and so it was at the age of eight and with a very loose grasp of the English language that Lance joined a new school in America.

 

The first few weeks were hell. Then the weeks following, worse still. His English was underdeveloped and he was the only foreign (read: coloured) kid in his school. This happened through a series of unlucky circumstances. His two youngest siblings were still in their nursery school, stay at home years and out of his older siblings, two were already starting college and one (Sofía, that fucking nerd) had received a scholarship to a nearby private school. This left Lance as the sole McClain joining Munising Public school. Whoo.

 

Lance thought it started off badly, when the other kids ignored him but mocked his accent behind his back. However, if he’d known then that that would be the high point of his school life, Lance might’ve attempted swimming back to Cuba.

 

If he was to pinpoint the moment when his life went from ‘ _Using a dildo without lube_ ’ to ‘ _Getting dry fisted by Wreck-it-Ralph_ ’ he would have had to trace it back to halfway through a math class in third grade. He’d been having a great time, really. Triangles were fucking intense. Or at least they might have been if Lance gave a shit. The only lesson he really payed attention to was English. For obvious reasons. As this _wasn’t_ English, Lance wasn’t too annoyed when he felt the all too familiar tingling of his soulmates pain. He was cautious though. It felt different from any time before. He could tell this injury was big. But,Lance was eight and reckless and had never really looked after his body that well to begin with. So, heedlessly, he took it.

 

The pain was immense.

 

Never in all his eight years had Lance felt so much pain. It burned across his leg like fire as his leg twisted up at an unnatural angle. At first, his classmates had laughed. _The funny Cuban boy at the back was making strange noises._ Yet _w_ hen they got a good look at his leg, the laughter died out, to be replaced with utter horror. Lance had to be carried out by his teacher, still screaming, and taken to the hospital to have his leg reset. His cast was a pretty purple colour.

 

After that, not even the kinder students, who would sometimes offer their company at break, would acknowledge him positively. Instead, he was teased for his stupidity in helping his soulmate.

“Why would you do that?” Sneered the leader of the boys, tall and freckled. “Your soulmate doesn’t even want you!” Lance ignored him and every other person who spoke to him about his soulmate. They didn’t know anything about his bond and had no right to speak about it. None of this was his soulmate’s fault and even if no one else cared about him, his soulmate would.

 

 

 

This mindless optimism was crushed at the age of twelve. His class had reached the age where they were to be given the mandatory soulmate discussions. The man spoke of safety and communication and other ways of maintaining a healthy soulmate bond, which all went right over Lance’s head as his mind swirled with the information he’d received just twenty minutes prior.

 

A classmate, Sarah, had asked him a question during homeroom. That alone was surprising for Lance. He wasn’t usually spoken to directly, unless the teacher forced them into group work, just gossiped about behind his back. So when pretty Sarah Miller, with her gapped teeth and wavy blonde hair, said she wanted to ask him a question, any suspicions that Lance might have had vanished.

“Sorry if this is personal but I don’t have a soulmate and I’ve always wondered, what does it feel like when they take away your pain?” Lance didn’t care if she’d wanted to know his bra size, he was available and desperate for friendship.

“That’s fine, it’s not personal at all. You’re not missing out on anything either as you can’t feel it.” Maybe if he’d payed more attention he’d have seen Sarah and her friends throwing him glances and whispering together beforehand. He might have heard the chatter dominating the classroom and how it had somehow turned to him. He definitely should have noticed how the whole class appeared to hold their breath as Sarah began their conversation. Unfortunately for Lance, he saw none of these things, so as he eagerly answered her question in the hopes of winning her friendship, it was an unwelcome surprise when most of his classmates began to laugh. Another girl spoke above the giggling,

“Yes, you can. It feels really good. Like, the pain dulls out and you get this nice warm feeling.” Lance frowned at her, eyebrows knitting together,

“I’ve never felt that,” A boy three desks away laughs,

“Your soulmate’s never taken your pain away?!” Lance said nothing, staring down at his desk, so the boy continued,

“Seriously? You’ve never had an injury go away for no reason?” Lance was dazed, the world he’d thought he’d known was being ripped away but he muttered quietly,

“No, I’ve never-” He was interrupted by raucous howling.

  
_“Are you serious?”_

 

_“That’s so lame!”_

 

_“Not even his soulmate wants him.”_

 

_“It's kind of sad.”_

 

Lance spent the rest of the day in another world, unaware of his surroundings. He then spent the rest of the night on the family computer, researching anything and everything he could find about ‘soulmates’. He wasn’t entirely sure why he’d never done it before, unless it was the fact that his soulmate was something private to him and even looking on the internet felt too public. That and having the internet was a relatively new thing. His mama had always worked with a laptop that Lance had been forbidden to touch so having such easy access to the ‘world wide web’ was like a portal to another universe. Yet it had been a portal Lance was uninterested in, until this moment in time. Now it was vital in his quest for knowledge.

 

Armed with new information, barely two weeks later and Lance was easily able to explain everything away. This person didn’t know him and why would you want to take pain away from a complete stranger? They weren’t doing anything abnormal and if they  _knew_  Lance it would be a whole different story. Lance was sure of it.

 

 

 

With that reasoning, Lance continued with what he was doing for the next two years, still painfully aware that every bruise, bump, and scratch he received stayed upon his skin until it healed. Which was fine. If his soulmate knew him, they’d act differently. They’d want to protect Lance.

 

Lance wanted to protect them too. It was hard, though. Incredibly hard. He knew his soulmate was being bullied - you just didn’t get that many injuries by yourself - but there was nothing he could do about it. Not like he was in a better position anyway. Despite joining high school, not much had changed. Within his first week, it had got out that Lance McClain had a soulmate that had never taken his pain away from him. Lance could have suffered the humiliation but there were always assholes that wanted to test this statement. Nothing terrible, just a few small injuries that, as always, remained unhealed. Salt in his wounds. This kind of bullying could be seen as a blessing or a curse considering his soulmate was suffering through the same thing. At least no one was going to question a couple extra bruises. With this in mind it wasn’t uncommon for Lance to take away all kinds of injuries throughout the day, but at half past seven, sitting on his bed and watching a thin cut travel up his bicep, Lance was instantly on guard.

 

This was a reflexive reaction, stemmed from a period of three to four weeks the previous year, when his soulmate had been purposefully hurting themselves. Back then, Lance had never felt more helpless in his life. The only thing he could do was keep taking the injuries away, caught in the knowledge that there was nothing he could do to ease whatever emotional pain his soulmate was going through. Thankfully that time hadn’t lasted long, and since then they haven't tried anything like it since. There were still several thin white scars across Lance’s thighs, mostly healed by scar removal cream but if you knew what you were looking for, still visible. These only served as a reminder of how little Lance could help his soulmate, so as soon as he had felt the half-familiar sting of a blade, Lance had dropped his English language book and sat up straight in his bed, shaking.

 

When the cut stopped growing, Lance stood to find something to stem the sluggish bleeding, only to drop back down at the feel of another slice. Lance whined in pain, this one was deeper than the previous. Longer too. A faint metallic taste filled his mouth that he recognised as blood. He was terrified. Was his soulmate doing this to themselves, or had someone attacked them? He wasn’t sure which scenario was worse.

 

For the next half hour, Lance lay curled up and whimpering on his bed as phantom blades buried their way into his skin. Each slice varied in length and depth but the pain was nothing in comparison to the fear Lance felt for his soulmate. He had no clue what they were going through. Whether they would be safe. Whether someone could help them. He refused to think of his final worry, _Whether they might die_. What would even happen to him if his soulmate died? Would Lance die with him? Could he die in their stead? Would they just leave Lance all alone?

 

Both books and the internet were embarrassingly vague with these types of questions. It seemed to vary from person to person. Some soulmate bonds were so strong that if one of them died so did the other, instantly. In others, there were cases where a person was brought back from death because their soulmate took the burden upon themselves. Lance knew that to save his soulmate he would do anything, but he really didn’t want to die. He wasn’t ready.

 

A dull kick to his gut brought him out of his hysteria, and with that, it all seemed to be over. He was winded, but slowly brought his legs up to his body and cried. He cried somewhat out of relief, but mostly for his soulmate. He cried for what they’d been through and how they’d suffered. He cried because he couldn’t be there for them and he cried because, realistically, he didn’t know if he ever could be.

 

Then he stopped.

 

There was a buzzing in his arm. Lower down than before, across his left forearm, the tingling that told him his soulmate was in pain. He pulled it away from them and onto himself.

 

It was worse than the ones before. The cuts were deeper. They burned as they entered his skin and lasted far longer than any of the ones before had, minutes upon minutes, as slow, deliberate cuts wound there way up his flesh. He was so focused on the pain of it, that it wasn’t until it was finally over and he had begun wiping the blood from his wounds that he saw them for what they were. Letters. Cruel and purposeful, and spelling the words, ‘I HATE YOU’.

 

Then there came a harsher pain, from his right arm. Lance watched in shock as a thick gash sliced it's way up the main artery in his arm. Blood gushed out at an alarming speed and for a second Lance was frozen in panic. Until, shaking himself out of his stupor, he staggered up from his bed and made his way downstairs as quickly as he could, putting pressure on his arm in a desperate attempt to stem the flow of blood.

 

He found his mama in the kitchen, hands wrapped around a massive orange cooking pot, but the cooking was soon forgotten as she looked up and saw Lance. He was an absolute mess, panicked sobs mixing with nonsensical babble as he attempted to communicate the situation. English and Spanish awkwardly mixed together as his fear grew,

“Oh my god, _ave maria_. They tried to kill me.  _No quiero morir. Voy a morir._ Aren’t I Madre? I’m sorry.  _Lo muy siento_. Help me please!” He swayed on his feet, dizzy from the blood loss.

 

His mama lept into action at once, abandoning dinner and driving Lance to the hospital at a speed that was nowhere near legal. For the next few hours, Lance remained unconscious, as he was administered an emergency blood transfusion and his arms were stitched up and bandaged. He didn’t wake up until the following day and that was a whole other shitstorm.

 

 

 

Two weeks.

 

That’s how long they made him stay in that hospital.

 

Two. Fucking. Weeks.

 

Apparently, when you’re brought in with your arms sliced open, a Class 3 hemorrhage and missing two pints of blood, doctors aren’t anxious to let you leave.  _'Why,'_  you ask? They thought it was self-inflicted. It didn’t matter how many people Lance told; sympathetic nurses, women with clipboards, heck even the janitor, none believed him. It was incredibly frustrating.

 

Yet, to his surprise, his mama accepted his account at once without demanding further proof. When he questioned that she heaved a sigh and told him,

“ _Pollito, you’ve been putting yourself on the line for your soulmate for as long as I can remember. Your mama knows better than anyone how much of a boneheaded idiot you are.”_ Lance gave a mock offended snort as his mama’s eyes lost their humor and she stared at him with a mix of protective instinct and rage.

_“Do not think you are getting let off easy at all. That was stupid and dangerous and it nearly cost you your life! I’ve turned a blind eye for years, knowing how stubborn you are, but I will not tolerate this any longer. You are not to take away any more of your soulmate’s pain. They do not deserve it. That is not a healthy relationship. You might think what you’re doing is sweet, or romantic but it’s just driving them further away from you. This-”_ she jabbed fiercely at his bandaged arms, “ _This is where that thinking has brought you. Your soulmate will not appreciate you removing that from them without their consent. You ever heard of ‘survivors guilt’?”_ Lance shook his head, desperately hoping that wasn’t a rhetorical question. His mama rolled her eyes,

“ _Then pick up a book and look it up. Don’t do that to your soulmate. They deserve better than that._ ” Lance nodded, speechless, but after a look at his face, his mama lost whatever was left of her anger and engulfed him in a hug. The physical contact was enough to break the dam of emotions inside of him, and with that, he began furiously sobbing on her shoulder. They remained that way for the rest of the night, Lance clutching on to that feeling of safety and protection as he seriously considered what she had said to him.

 

She was right. He at least knew that. What he was doing _wasn’t_ healthy, for either of them, but he didn’t know what else to do. His soulmate was all he had at this point. Them and his mama. The age gaps between him and his siblings were too large and he was long past attempting to make friends at school. If he didn’t have his soulmate, he had nothing. And, if he didn’t keep taking his soulmate’s pain, who’s to say they wouldn’t forget about him too? If he stopped taking the pain then the bond between them would be lost and Lance would really have no hope of ever finding them. What was he meant to do?

 

The next morning he spoke to a man in a blue suit. He was a soulmate advisor and spoke to Lance in great detail about the dangers of taking an unknown soulmate’s pain. Lance didn’t listen to a word he said. Nothing the man could say would resonate more than his mama’s words last night. He switched on a little when the man talked about soulmate laws. Those two words had always been a sort of paradox. How can you oversee something that comes from the connection of two people's  _souls_? Fact is, you can’t. The government had spent years desperately trying to dictate soulmates but it was impossible to create a law that would work for every type of bond.

 

You see, soulmate bonds had a very nasty setup that could easily result in unhealthy, abusive relationships but there was no way to regulate them and therefore no way to control them. The best the government could do was stop outsider influence. Therefore the soulmate laws were put in place, ensuring that whatever happened between two soulmates was a completely private affair and no one but them had any right to dictate how they co-habilitated with one another. It kind of worked. Lance couldn’t think of a better idea so he had no right to criticise it. Anyway, all that meant was Mr Striped Tie could preach to him for as long as he wanted but at the end of the day, he had no say in how Lance chose to act with his soulmate. So, when he returned from his two-week stay in hospital, no one had any right to tell Lance  _not_  to take every injury his soulmate had accumulated that fortnight. Nor could they talk about how Lance cried himself to sleep that night, but that’s only because he didn’t let anyone see.

 

 

 

One month from then and Lance should have been ecstatic. He’d gotten into the Garrison! All those hours of studying and self-hatred finally paid off. He might even get to meet Shirogane Takashi. That might be a little weird though, what with having had posters of the man’s face across his walls for the past seven years. In fact, he'd been the reason Lance was so interested in space to begin with.

 

It was kind of sad really. Maybe six months after Lance had first moved to America, he’d walked into a computing store instead of the taking the road back home. Some kid had drawn on his pencil case and he just hadn’t been ready to go back home and lie about what a great day he’d had at school. Instead, he’d wandered the aisles, watching the promo videos play across the monitors. It wasn’t as relaxing as he might have hoped. Just serving to remind him of how little he understood the English language. He picked up words here and there but most of it was an incoherent jumble of unfamiliar sounds and phrases. Overwhelming.

“Space.” Lance turned his head to the screen on his left showing a young, good-looking man. He recognised that word. ‘ _Espacio’,_

“It’s beautiful, isn’t it?”, ‘ _Es hermoso ¿verdad?'_ The man smiled,

“My name is Shirogane Takashi and-”, ‘ _Mi nombre es Shirogane Takashi y-’_ Lance didn’t understand the words that followed but he focussed on the passion and excitement colouring the man’s voice and found himself drawn to it. His distress forgotten, Lance bounded home, tracked down the commercial and then proceeded to spend half an hour translating it word for word. Holding the completed result gave him an incredible feeling and after pinning the scrap paper to the wall above his bed, Lance doubled the efforts he was putting into learning English as well as spending any free time researching both space and The Garrison, the place where Shirogane worked as a pilot. Lance wanted to follow in this man’s footsteps, and if he had to go into space to do so, so be it.

 

Knowing all of this, and clutching his Garrison acceptance letter, Lance should have been bouncing off the walls.

 

But he wasn’t.

 

Because he hadn’t felt anything from his soulmate in a week.

 

Lance was worried. When two weeks had passed, Lanc was pretty distressed and by week three Lance was nothing short of terrified. That was why, in the dead of night Lance phoned a soulmate advisor company, looking for help. His prayers were answered by a woman called Carol who listened to his fretful babbles about how he thought his soulmate might have died because he hadn’t felt anything in _weeks_ and how his soulmate was a fucking disaster so there was no way they had managed to just  _not_ injure themselves for three whole weeks!! Immediately Carol assured him that there was no way his soulmate had died without his knowledge. The passing of a soulmate was equivalent to having a piece of your heart ripped out (hence the name) and was never something that happened subtlety. Soulmate deaths had been know to wake coma patients because of their strength so there was almost definitely no way Lance had accidentally slept through the partial removal of his soul. On the other hand, a complete radio silence from a soulmate was practically unheard of. she'd suggested they might be in a coma and asked if Lance had been having inexplicable bouts of fatigue. She'd listed off more symptoms and Lance had vetoed the idea.

Finally, after a long period of nothing but paper rustling, Carol suggested his soulmate had used a restrictor. This prompted the question, what’s a restrictor? Carol quickly explained that their existence was because of a small government-led project to create a device that prevented people with high-risk jobs from being a burden on their soulmate. For instance, a surgeon doesn’t want to accidentally take on a broken wrist halfway through an incision.

 

However, those devices were brand-spanking new and were nowhere near hitting the mainstream market for at least another decade. Therefore, Lance’s soulmate was either loaded or had excellent connections. This information meant nothing to Lance. His soulmate had chosen to cut him off. He knew they didn’t like him. The scars across his arms and legs were proof enough of that. But he’d never thought they could be so callous. To just discard him, like an old doll they’d never been that fond of. He moved away from those thoughts, this wasn’t necessarily permanent. He had no idea what his soulmate did. Anything could happen.

 

Yet deep down, Lance knew they weren’t coming back.

 

 

 

After that, no matter what he did, Lance never felt anything from his soulmate.

 

It was hard to move on. No, worse than hard. Like one day someone ripped off your arms and from then on, all that anyone asked you to do was lift things. The Garrison was a welcome distraction. On his first day he met a guy called Hunk and Lance vowed to protect him with his life. He was the whole package; good-humored, excellent cook, gorgeous. He was also the main rebuilder of Lance’s confidence. Until they’d disappeared, Lance had never really considered just how much of his life he’d built up around his soulmate. He had pinned all of his romantic ideals onto this person he’d created in his head and when they hadn’t been everything he’d expected, he’d felt lost.

 

During the next two years, Lance properly came to terms with his misplaced feelings regarding his soulmate. The relationship the two of them had was not healthy and that was mainly his fault. Lance had to accept that. After he came to that conclusion, however, Lance felt freer than he had in years. Letting go of his soulmate opened up a whole new world and, boy was Lance ready for some of that. Girls were adorable. Guys were fucking gorgeous. Lance was both, everyone’s a winner! Realistically Lance knew the flirting was meaningless. Sure it was fun to see how smoothly he could drop a line but he was really only doing it because he _could_. All his life, any romantic dream he had was centered around his soulmate until even the very idea of love was a far-off fantasy. Only now, for the first time ever, Lance was allowed to date  _anyone_ and he was gladly abusing that privilege.

 

Hunk was confused if not supportive. Lance wanted to explain his promiscuous nature but to be honest, he really wasn’t ready to talk about any of it. That’s not to say he didn’t love being himself now. He was more outgoing, more friendly. He and Hunk were a dream team of mischief and the Garrison was everything he could have hoped for. Except for Iverson. That dude was a class A prick. Fuck Iverson.

 

That was another thing his new found independence gave him. Hatred. Nah, maybe that was a bit strong. Then Lance thought about the words forever carved into his skin, about the injuries he’d had to hide from everyone around him for years, the fact that never once had he felt the supposedly pleasant feeling of a soulmate protecting you.

 

Lance hated his soulmate.

 

About two months into his first year Lance took the exam to get into Pilot class. Unfortunately, about two months in, during his pilot exam Lance was ill. Lance was so fucking ill. His head ached, his throat itched and his nose felt like Hoover Dam. Also, all the stupid English words were floating off the page. He would have cursed if he wasn’t in an exam hall. His English was near perfect at this point. Most of the time no one even heard his accent and it had been years since someone had asked where he came from, because he sounded so native. Thanks Shiro. Not now though, apparently. Not during possibly the _most_ important exam he would ever take in his life. No sir. Error 401, File Not Found, please contact service area of Fuck You.

 

Staring blankly at the empty box he was meant to write in, Lance remembered an incident from his elementary school.  _Man, that was a long time ago. Wonder what happened to Nibbles the class hamster._ It was only his second - maybe third - week of school and back when the teacher was still bothering to try and coerce the rest of Lance’s classmates to play with him. Of course, Lance understood bugger all so she might as well have not bothered. Still, when she pleadingly asked a rather overweight blonde to play a game with him, he had listened attentively in hopes of understanding some of what she said.

 

“No!” Spat the child in response, eyes narrowing at Lance, “I don’t want to play  _any_ games with  _him_!” Lance, in all his childish naivety, stared back, thinking furiously in hopes of translating the words. He was fairly sure he understood a few of them so maybe he could work on that.

“ _¿dijiste playa?_ ” The confused look on the other boy’s face quickly shifted to anger,

“Speak English, stupid!”

 

Lance felt pretty stupid now. The words in front of him were growing and shrinking alarmingly. Just keep writing. He couldn’t mess this up just because of some stupid head cold. Just finish the fucking test. Get into the pilot class and maybe receive a high five from Shirogane. Easy peasy.

 

 

 

Two points.

 

Two points.

 

_Two points._

 

That was the difference in scores between Lance and the lowest scorer in the pilot class. He had managed to pick up enough points during his flight test to make up for his abysmally low score on his written paper. It wasn’t enough, though. He had _so close_  and he knew he could have done better. It was infuriating. And disappointing. Why would a cargo pilot ever get to meet Shirogane Takashi?

 

 

 

A month later it didn’t matter what class Lance was. There was no way he would ever meet Shirogane. The Kerberos mission had failed.

 

Luck was a two-faced bitch however because not a week after that, Lance was bumped up to pilot class. Some guy named Keith dropped out. He was meant to be the best in the Garrison. Lance wasn’t complaining though. He didn't care what cosmic force caused Keith to pack his bags but he was grateful nonetheless.

 

During the next year, that opinion changed. It seemed every time he messed up, there’d be at least three people reminding him that Keith would never do something like that. Keith was the best pilot the Garrison had seen since Shiro. Keith single-handedly stopped world hunger, saved the ice caps and found a cure for cancer! Apparently, every teacher in the Garrison thought it was useful to continuously remind him that the _only_  reason he was in pilot class was 'cause Keith had Alan Parrished on everyone’s ass.

 

One Saturday night Lance had got extremely drunk and researched everything he could on the guy. Why was he so special anyway? Lousy fucker. I mean suuure, of fucking course he was incredibly good looking to top it off. That’s fair, but there really weren’t many reasons as to why everyone was singing his praises. He had a mullet for god’s sake! Who even had those anymore? Did he lose a dare? Was he visually impaired? Had he pissed off his hairdresser?

 

Sober Lance was horrendously embarrassed to discover that drunk Lance had written a four hundred word backstory on the reasons behind Keith’s hairdresser’s intense and burning hatred towards him. It wasn’t even well written.

 

Never minding that, the truth was, Lance didn’t like the guy. That mullety asshole.

 

So why was it, on a humid summer night where Lance was perfectly happy to chat to Pidge and Hunk about cryptids till the sun rose, did the mullet that haunted his dreams reappear with a vengeance? In another situation, Lance would have been capable of putting great thought and detail into his answer. Present Lance was given no such luxury and was instead shoved mercilessly through emotional and physical turmoil. If someone were to take a look at his internal monologue during the next couple of hours, it would have gone something like this:

 

Hey, there’s Keith. HoLy fUcK It’S sHiRo! And a massive blue lion, cool beans. Now they’re in space - was Lance dreaming? This felt like something he’d dream up - Okay alien spaceship that’s - oh we shot it, that’s cool too. Now they’re on an alien planet - still not sure how much of this is real - and they’re just walking into it, nice, that’s probably _totally_  safe. Creepy alien house. Creepy alien house. I’m not a celebrity, get me the fuck out. Ooh, hot space babe in his arms, play it cool. Nope she said my ears were hideous and judo flipped me, that's like minus third base. Also, it really hurt - that kind of debunks the whole dream theory, shit. Space babe has a friend. Wait, update, her name is not space babe, it’s Allura. That’s an awesome name. Five stars. And Mr Mustachio over there is called Coran. Once again, excellent name, very alien.

  


The aliens, sorry _Alteans,_ gave the group of humans some much-needed exposition and then promptly dumped the news that, ‘ _Hey, unqualified teenagers, from now on you’re going to fly SPACE ROBOT CATS! Isn’t that rad?! Also, the fate of the universe rests upon you not fucking up - good luck!’_ To be honest that was a bit of a bummer but the team took it in their stride. Kinda.

 

The first couple of weeks were crazy. They beat up bad guys. Came together as a group. Found out Pidge was a girl. Honestly, that kind of sucked for Lance. It wasn’t that Lance thought she was a boy, it was that for the last year he hadn’t been entirely sure of her gender. Some people called her a boy, some a girl. It was confusing and scary and after about six months Lance was too afraid to ask.

 

They also found out more about the war they were fighting in. Lance felt really bad for Allura and Coran, also slightly scared and very impressed. His emotions were frankly a bit of a mess. But to wake up, get told you took a ten-thousand-year-old catnap, that your friends, family, planet and everything you knew had been destroyed and then JUST SOLDIER ON! Lance respected the hell out of that.

 

Lance also, maybe, kind of, forgave Mr Mullet. Sure it was easy to hate him when he’d been at the Garrison and repeatedly told how worthless he was compared to Keith. But now they were stuck on a spaceship together and Lance could see that he wasn’t _‘trying to be a bad boy_ ’. Keith was just awkward. Didn’t mean Lance stopped making fun of him. He was a petty bitch after all. Just meant the tone was teasing rather than spiteful. Cleared the air, you know. Better vibes.

  
So yeah, everything was a bit new and frightening, but they were managing it without any  _severe_ consequences for the most part.

 

Then Allura got a papercut and everything went to shit.

 

Well, maybe not a papercut. Altean paper. It was really weird. Like, you touched it and it sort of _wobbled_ , like jelly. But solid-er. Also no pens! You just spoke to the space paper and it scribed it for you. Pretty neat. Shiro hated them calling it space paper. That was entirely Lance and Pidge’s fault. After about four days they unanimously decided to call everything space ____. No particular reason. Just thought it was funny. After two weeks, every time the word ‘space’ left one of their mouths, Shiro’s eye twitched. Lance was fairly sure they were halfway to causing the man a nervous breakdown. Cool.

 

Speaking of Shiro, he was  _awesome_!! Whoever said ‘never meet your heroes’ was an idiot. Sure, Lance was a lil dazzled at first. This was the guy whose face had loomed off his wall for nearly a decade. After he got over his starstruck-ness though, Shiro was great! That was sort of what made it so sad. Knowing Shiro was just a kid like the rest of them. Knowing that, despite that, he’d gone through so much. You could tell. How sometimes he’d get that look in his eye. It’d happened a couple of times. Him getting flashbacks. Those were never good for anyone.

 

And, despite that, he was healing. He spent a lot of time meditating and Lance knew it was really paying off. His skin had a healthier glow and he would eat more at mealtimes. Lance was quite impressed by that alone. Seriously, whose idea was it to have _goo_?! That aside, Shiro was getting better. Lance always tried to crack a couple jokes around the guy. Sure, he groaned and pretended he didn’t appreciate Lance’s incredible wit and comic timing, but it always brought a fond smile to his face and didn’t that just make Lance feel all warm and gooey inside?

 

Wait, where was he? Ah yes, space paper. Considering the response, the whole thing was pretty anticlimactic, except the second the cut sliced her finger, Shiro snapped his head around so quickly Lance thought he’d get whiplash. Then there was a pregnant pause, as half the room’s occupants looked in concern at Shiro and the other half stared at the creamy blue drop of blood oozing from Allura’s hand. Then Shiro dropped his gaze and closed his eyes, concentrating, until Allura broke the silence with a surprised gasp.

 

“It’s gone!” Coran walked over in concern,  
“What do you mean?”

“The cut on my finger vanished! What does that mean?” Allura asked worriedly.

“It means,” Shiro began, uncertainty, “That you’re my soulmate.” If anything, Allura looked more confused and whilst Shiro rushed to explain, his thoughts came out awkwardly and did little to help her bewilderment.

 

“Sorry to spring that on you, Allura. It’s an Earthen thing. At least I think it is. I haven’t seen many other planets. But on Earth, most people have something called a soulmate. Um, it’s not necessarily romantic but a lot of people perceive it that way. I never thought I had one - why would I? I never felt anything - but I guess it makes sense. You were in cryosleep, so of course you wouldn’t have any injuries, and that’s why I felt so tired all the time. I thought I was just odd. Or lazy. But this makes sense. It’s ridiculous, but it makes sense.” He straightened up to look at Allura. She gave him a look that Lance dubbed  _‘I'm pissed off and if you don’t cooperate in the next five seconds, it’s going to get a whole lot worse_ ’ Lance hated that look. He was pretty sure Shiro hated it too, if his flinch was anything to go by.

 

“How so?” Ooh, that was frosty. Shiro seemed unsure how to explain, opening and closing his mouth several times. Lance had never seen the man look so uncertain. Finally, he choked out,

“I’m sorry, could I speak to you in private about this? I’m not sure how, but I think you may have gotten mixed up in a part of Earthen culture.” Allura nodded her consent, intrigued by this admission and the two left the room.

 

They didn’t return that evening and after a lot of innuendos, courtesy of Lance and Pidge, the paladins began making their way back to their rooms.

 

After all of that, Lance was expecting a lie in, late breakfast and team bonding, not the sound of an emergency alarm that screamed like it’d been stabbed. The alarm brought in mixed responses. There was Shiro and Keith, in full battle armor, naturally. Hunk, dazed and confused but resolutely clutching his bayard and finally, Pidge and Lance, still in pajamas with hair braided wildly from the previous night's sleepover. To tell you the truth, Lance kind of thought they deserved the chewing out they were bound to get. He could admit when he was in the wrong.

 

Yet, Allura was smiling and Shiro was blushing. Excuse him, let Lancey Lance repeat that, Shirogane Takashi, crew member of the Kerberos mission, pilot of the black lion, head of Voltron, was red-faced and googly-eyed. It was weird. Like seeing your teacher on a date. Lance shuddered at the mental image of Iverson getting it on. He did not need that sort of negativity in his life right now.

 

“Paladins,” Allura began, snapping him back to attention, “If you hadn't gathered from last night, I wish to tell you that Shiro and I are soulmates.” Almost unanimously the rest of the team began making noises of mock surprise. Shiro gave them a look. Allura went on,  
“This is unexpected to say the least and although I have been informed that on Earth this is more of a private thing, I believe, as your leaders, we should set a good example and make sure that we do not unintentionally place you all in a difficult situation.

Shiro and I have decided that, with the war as it is, we shall not take away life-threatening injuries from one another. That sort of guilt and lack of control is not something that would work well within the team. Illnesses are another issue. If we encounter something where one species is better equipped with dealing with it than the other, depending on the situation we will discuss pros and cons and come to a reasonable conclusion. I am telling you all this so, if the time comes, we will not catch you off guard and worry you unnecessarily. Is this alright with all of you?”

 

The paladins nodded their agreement and Hunk stood up,

“My mum always told me that your soulmate is something that is private to you and therefore, no one else would ever have the right to impose on that.” Lance looked at Hunk’s earnestness and felt incredibly touched,

“Well said buddy.” Allura smiled in a relieved sort of way.

 

“With that out of the way, this brings me to the second point I wanted to talk to you about, this quintet. After learning in detail about soulmates last night I believe that it will be a useful bonding exercise for you all to speak about your soulmates. This will also be practical information for Coran’s medical endeavors, as we would prefer not to have too many unknown variables if one of you is injured. We will be using the training room floor so I expect to see you all there and suited up in the next five dobooshes.”

 

Lance blanched,

“I’m not sure-” Pidge elbowed him harshly,

“Sounds good princess, see ya in five!” Then with one arm on Hunk and the other on Lance, she frogmarched them out the room.

 

“Ouch Pidge, what the hell?” She gave him a flat look,

“This is a time-consuming exercise that doesn’t require my blood, sweat, and tears. Do not take this away from me!” Her eyes glittered dangerously. Lance nodded mutely.

“No prob, Bob.”

 

Seeing as no one else seemed uncomfortable in revealing _incredibly private information_ amongst people they’d  _just met,_  it wasn’t long before they were all sitting cross-legged on the training room floor. No one seemed too anxious to be the first to speak. After several long seconds of silence, Pidge rolled her eyes, exasperated,

“Guess I’ll start then. Not that there’s much to say. I don’t have a soulmate. I’m not particularly bothered about it, I’ve just never felt that connection - you know?” She stopped, stealing a glance at Shiro and Allura,

“Although, if Shiro’s anything to go on, my options are still open apparently.” Shiro smiled at her,

“Thanks Pidge. Hunk, would you mind going next?” Hunk shook his head. He took a couple of seconds to begin and during that time his eyes slightly glazed over and a small smile made its way onto his face. In that moment Lance had never wanted to protect anything more in his life. That boy was  _precious_.

 

“Um, I _do_ have a soulmate but I’ve never met them. Well, we’ve never spoken or anything either so it’s not like I know them very well but we have a sort of system. So, if one of us has a small to medium injury the other will take it from them but if it’s larger than that we leave it. I’m not sure what their opinion is about it, but I’m sort of glad because I’m not sure if I could handle it if I really badly injured myself and then the pain disappeared and I knew my soulmate had it.” He shuddered, looking upset at the mere thought.

“So, yeah, I think for now, what we’ve got is good. I’d love to meet them properly though.” The last words were mumbled, like a private admission. Hunk fidgeted with his hands when he’d finished, smile not leaving his features.

 

Pidge laughed, not unkindly,

“Smooth moves, Hunk. I always knew you were a romantic!” Shiro nodded,

“I’m proud of that, Hunk. That’s a very mature conclusion for the two of you to come to.” He turned his head to Lance,

“Go on then Lance, I know you’ve been dying to speak.”

 

Shiro was wrong. In any other circumstance that would have been incredibly reassuring and comforting. The guy wasn’t perfect. He made mistakes like anyone else. Good to know. This, however, was the  _wrong_ time, Shiro was wrong and Lance was suFFeriNG.

 

_No._ he told himself.  _Just don’t make a big deal about it, they’re good people, they’ll understand._ He gave a small nervous laugh,

“Nah, not really Shiro, not much to talk about.” Shiro looked like a kicked puppy, eyes wide and remorseful,

“Oh, I’m sorry Lance I didn’t know-” Lance cut him off, what kind of cruel man would let that continue?

“No it’s not that-” This time Pidge spoke out,

“So you  _do_ have a soulmate?” Lance winced.

“No, sort of, I don’t know. I just really don’t want to talk about them thanks.”

 

Lance knew he could have just said he didn’t have a soulmate and be done with it, but he couldn’t bring himself to do so. No matter what they had done, or how badly they’d hurt him, he couldn’t just deny their existence. That would be like spitting on the romantic ideals he’d carried for the two of them since he was young. He couldn’t erase them from his life like that. It wasn’t right.

 

The team seemed to respect his privacy, Shiro apologetic and Pidge, still curious, but subdued. As usual, however, Keith didn’t pick up the memo on ‘how to correctly interpret human emotion’ and blundered in like a blindfolded Gibbon.

“Since when have you _not_ wanted to talk about yourself?” His tone was incredulous, like the idea of Lance being anything other than a self-absorbed idiot was impossible to comprehend. That little bitch. Lance felt his temper rising.

“Since this was  _not_  any of your business. Talk about  _your_ soulmate, mullet!” A conflicted sort of look crossed Keith’s face until he replaced it with a smug half smile,

“I don’t have a soulmate.”

 

There was a definite pleased note to Keith’s voice and the whole thing was just so typically  _Keith_  that Lance wanted to scream. Of course that little emo would be happy to be denied the one thing Lance wanted more than anything else. He gave a bitter laugh,

“Of course _you’d_ be happy about that.” Keith’s eyebrows knitted together,

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Lance laughed again, frustration and long-held pain leaking into his voice,

“What, lone wolf Keith? The top pilot of the Garrison. Talented. Gorgeous. Bet you can’t think of anything worse than something as pathetic as a soulmate dragging you down. I’m sure you love being above it all!”

 

“Lance, what the fuck?” This time Pidge spoke, looking almost afraid of Lance,

“We don’t care if you have a soulmate or not, but that was out of line!” Lance felt his voice shake as he tried to explain to the team,

“I  _do_  have a soulmate. I-I mean I used to anyway.” He dropped his head slightly, not wanting to look at their faces. He looked back up at the sound of Hunks sniff in time to see his best friend in the universe crying. He’d never seen Hunk look so upset, it was heartbreaking.

 

“I’m so sorry Lance. You never talked about your soulmate at the Garrison and at first I thought it was just because you were a private person but then I knew you for about a week, so of course it couldn’t have been that! And after that, for some reason, soulmates just never seemed to come up when  _we_ were talking and if anyone else mentioned it, you just avoided the topic and I just kind of figured you didn’t have one. Because I  _knew_ you and if you did have a soulmate you would have spent every waking hour of the day boasting about them. Except you didn’t, so I just assumed and I’m so sorry for not noticing I’m the worst friend ever!” Lance’s lip quivered and all of a sudden he tacked Hunk in a bear hug, unable to listen to any more of what he was saying.

 

“Hunk, there’s no way you’re a terrible friend. I just didn’t want to talk about them. That’s not your fault. Look, if I ever find them I’ll introduce you two.” At these last words, a different kind of atmosphere blanketed the room.

  
“What do you mean Lance, you said your soulmate was dead.” Pidge sounded apprehensive. Lance shook his head at her words.   
“No, they’re not dead. It’s just. My soulmate hates me.” Whatever reaction Lance was expecting, this was not it. It was like the whole room relaxed at that. Hunk’s grip around him fell away and Pidge let out a derisive snort.

 

“Seriously, you were just being dramatic?” Lance whipped his head round to face her,

“WHat?” Pidge rolled her eyes at him, all previous concern wiped away,

“Lance, your soulmate can’t hate you, it’s impossible.” Lance moved back towards Hunk and miserably began rattling off all the instances he could remember of soulmates hating one another. That had been a wild Tuesday night last year. Hunk wrapped his arm tighter around Lance and added,

“Dude, how could someone hate _you_? Least of all your soulmate.” Lance pulled his face out of Hunk’s chest to look at him in disbelief. Shiro stepped forward,

“Lance, Hunk’s right.” He gave Lance a fond smile, “Are you sure you’re not just being dramatic?”

 

Lance was unable to react for a few seconds, body shaking in betrayal. Then he pulled away completely from Hunk and stepped closer to Shiro, voice trembling with emotion,

“When I was fourteen my soulmate tried to kill me.” Then he left the room, no one making any attempt to try and stop him.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm back! Here's Keith's pov... might clear some things up.

Keith was seven when he first heard about soulmates. He’d grown up in White Willow Orphanage and whilst everyone treated him decently they had a lot of kids to look after, so Keith wasn’t a top priority all the time. He had always been an adventurous kid anyway, so he welcomed the freedom he was given. Unfortunately, the cost of being an adventurous kid was the near permanent bruises, cuts, and scrapes that littered his body. Jackie, (a woman who worked in the orphanage) was forever telling him to look after himself more.  
“For God’s sake Keith, people are going to think we beat you here!” Six-year-old Keith gave her an unimpressed stare,  
“But you don’t.” Jackie gave up.

Anyway, by the age of seven, Keith was pretty used to the injuries - you had to make sacrifices if you were going to be the best tree climber in the orphanage. And that’s why it took him very little time to notice that they’d stopped appearing. It started with his leg; he’d looked down at it, knowing that the previous day he’d fallen off of a log, yet where there would normally be a large pinky blue bruise, there was nothing. Just smooth unblemished skin. This anomaly carried on for two weeks and Keith steadily grew more and more uncertain. What was he supposed to do? He’d watched all the X-Men films and he was honestly a little terrified.

Finally, after the third week of no bruises, Keith mustered up the courage to speak to Jackie. She was the only one he trusted with that information. To his immense surprise she neither screamed nor phoned the X-Mansion - he was a little disappointed about that second bit. Instead, she laughed at him before launching into a twenty-minute talk about soulmates; how your soulmate has the ability to take away your pain and you have the ability to take away theirs.

In Keith’s opinion, it was stupid. Why would he want someone else’s pain? He already had his own. Plus, he’d never even met his ‘soulmate’, he didn’t know what kind of person they were, what they liked to do, how did he even know if they deserved it?

For the next year, Keith pretty much ignored his ‘soulmate’. It was weird at first, having injuries fade away almost as soon as he received them but he got used to it quite quickly. In fact, it pushed him to new and greater heights, removing his already underdeveloped sense of self-preservation. Yet he wasn’t stupid about it, even if his soulmate was. He didn’t want to hurt them too badly, so he tried not to do anything too reckless.

Until he fell out of a tree.

It hurt. It hurt a lot. It hurt so bad he repeated a word he’d heard the older boys say when they hurt themselves. He was so loud he attracted the attention of some of the younger kids that were playing nearby. They came over in a flock and looked down at him with varying levels of disgust, eyes focused on the way his leg twisted unnaturally. Keith had seen it too, but only for a few seconds. It looked really bad. He _knew_ his leg wasn’t supposed to bend that way. Faintly he heard the kids whispering to each other, as his vision and hearing swam in and out. Everything around him was beginning to get pretty fuzzy and Keith had an overwhelming urge to fall asleep.

Until, like a switch had been flicked, everything sharpened and he felt wide awake.

That was odd. Even the pain in his leg seemed to have died down. Wait, scratch that. _Vanished_.

Feeling a lot better then he had two minutes ago. Keith struggled to sit up, only half aware of the horrified faces of the kids around him - what’s their deal? Their deal was his leg. His completely undamaged, lily-white leg. The children exchanged quick, frightened glances with each other, then scampered off like the cowards they were.

Keith got up in a more measured way, head still spinning from his brief bout of unconsciousness. Slowly he made his way back to the Orphanage where rumours about ‘ _That creepy boy with the purple eyes.’_ were already circulating. Keith was told to speak with the nurse but once she gave him the green light, he was free to return to his shared room.

No one spoke to him that night.

The next day everyone in the Orphanage was given a talk on soulmates. Keith thought it must have been the staff’s way to prevent the flood of nasty gossip that had been shared during the past twenty-four hours. It was nice of them, but it didn’t work. Despite the schooling, everyone was still uncomfortable around Keith. They had all realised simultaneously that Keith never seemed to be injured anymore, despite his impulsiveness. This then prompted the unspoken question of, _‘Why not me? Why hasn’t my soulmate taken my pain?_ ’ It wasn’t a mature reaction, but children weren’t mature. Keith had to deal with the repercussions. He decided then and there that he didn’t like his soulmate. Out of pure spite, he vowed never to take away their pain. He had been right. They _didn’t_ deserve it.

The next few years were like a depressing helta skelta of negativity. The Orphanage's opinion of him changed from fear and unease, to jealousy and rage. Turns out, not everyone had a soulmate as ‘ _nice_ ’ as Keith's. He hated it. His attitude didn’t help matters. All the other kids saw was a guy who had the perfect soulmate being an ungrateful bastard about it. Ha, perfect. What did they know?

This brought about a new problem - no matter what the older kids did to him, there was never any evidence. After all, what’s a better incentive to beat up someone you dislike than, _‘Hey, this boy has any injury inflicted upon him taken_ away. _No matter how much you hurt him there’ll be no proof!”_

To combat that kind of reaction, Keith isolated himself, breaking ties with the half-hearted friendships he’d formed in the orphanage and retreating into his own shell. It was depressingly easy to do so. Jackie had left three months ago.

It didn’t really help. Now he could just add ‘lonely’ to the list of adjectives that described his life.

When he joined middle school it got worse. Even Keith was surprised by that, he wasn’t sure how that’d be possible, but someone from the Orphanage let slip that Keith had a soulmate that took away any kind of pain he received. And, well, what more do kids love than a challenge?

Possibly Keith’s lowest point was sometime during seventh grade. He was just so _tired_ , of the bullying and the people around him. Of his life. He stole a knife from the kitchen and locked himself in the bathroom. The first cut of the knife felt horrifyingly good, the pain and the control he had. It was his. His thigh burned but it was his pain and he’d done it himself. Then, slowly, it ebbed away leaving Keith with a bloody knife and a pleasantly tingling leg. He’d wanted to scream. It was HIS PAIN! He had EARNED it. His soulmate had NO RIGHT to take it from him.

But there was nothing Keith could do. He tried again and again for the next couple of weeks, longing for that feeling of self-control but it did not come. His soulmate must have been getting by on little to no sleep, cuts disappearing seconds after they were made. Keith had never felt a stronger hatred towards anyone before.

The anger Keith harbored probably didn’t help matters. As time passed by he grew more and more aggressive in response to the bullying. He got into fights almost daily and by the time he joined high school, there was an alarmingly long list of people out to get him.

In hindsight, he should have been more alert. A group of four boys tagged him on his way back to the Orphanage, dragging him behind a closed up Subway. Keith struggled and kicked out against his captors, fear bubbling in his throat. He half recognised the sandy blond in the middle but the others were unknown. Despite his struggles, the boys held fast, four against one leaning heavily in their favour. The guy holding his left arm muttered to the sandy blond,  
“How fast does it go?” Sandy smirked,  
“Wanna find out?” Lefty’s response was in the form of a switchblade lightly trailing across Keith’s left bicep. Keith went rigid as soon as the cool metal touched his skin, air leaving his mouth in short exhales. His heart was thumping erratically inside his chest and his hearing had started to feel muffled, like a blanket had draped across it.

A dark-haired boy on Keith’s right scoffed, the sound muted in Keith’s ears.  
“Don’t be a pussy.” He snatched the blade up and scratched it across Keith’s other arm, a far deeper cut than the previous. Keith tried not to show how much it hurt by clenching his jaw so tightly he could taste blood. Until, as quickly as it came the flavour vanished, along with the cuts along his arms. Lefty gave an amused laugh, prodding the skin of his forearm,  
“Now I really want to test this out.”

Looking back, Keith wasn’t entirely sure how he lived through the following half hour. It felt like days to him, the panic and helplessness of his situation consuming him. Cuts of all lengths and depths crisscrossed up his arms, only to vanish before he could properly see them. Keith soon gave up trying to put up a front, tears soaking his cheeks and sobs wracking his body. He had never wanted to die more in his life.

When they stopped it was from boredom. That was how little Keith’s life meant to them. He didn't think he could ever forget that.

The dark haired boy yawned,  
“This is dull. We can’t hurt him ‘cause his soulmate takes it away. I want to do something fun.” There were murmured agreements around the group and with that, Keith was dropped to the floor with one final kick to the stomach. By the time he was able to acknowledge it, the pain had already faded away. All he had to show for that half hour of torture was dusty clothes.

Keith felt mechanical walking back to the Orphanage. He watched his hand pushing the familiar door open but couldn’t for the life of him remember getting there. No one questioned his movements, he didn’t speak with the other kids. Not even when he left the kitchen, half concealing a sharp knife. He kept the blade clenched in his hand as he ascended the stairs, entering his small but private bedroom. He locked the door behind him and sat high up on his bed, leaning against the headboard. It felt like everything had slowly been building up to this; the bullying, the abandonment, the loneliness. And it was his soulmate’s fault. All of it. Every bruise. Every scratch. Every trauma.

You see, it didn’t matter that they took it away if it was their fault to begin with.

He barely felt the pain at first, as he began to slice letters deep within his arm. And when he did he decided it didn’t matter. _His soulmate would take it away anyway._ He carved out words with careful deliberation and allowed himself a cold, satisfied smirk when his arm briefly shone the words, ‘I HATE YOU’ in ruby red ink. Watching this too vanish before his eyes was what pushed him over the edge. Like he was suddenly possessed, he drove the blade deep into his opposite arm, slicing in a downwards arc. He wanted to scream but he couldn’t because then someone would investigate.

It was HIS pain! Why couldn’t he feel his own pain? Why was someone he had never met taking it away from him? Did they feel obliged because they were his soulmate? It had to be that. There was no other reason to. But that in itself was sick. Keith refused to have the only love bestowed upon him to be from someone that had no choice in the matter. Because that sure as hell wasn’t love and he hated it. _He hated it_. He hated the lack of control, the lack of possession, being unable to control his own FUCKING body! It was horrific. It was wrong. _He_ was wrong.

For two weeks Keith dared to hope. Bruises dotted his skin, weaving between scratches from the most mundane of things. For a short while Keith allowed himself to entertain the thought that his soulmate had given up.

Then one morning he woke to clear, unblemished skin.

The pain in his fist from punching the wall disappeared as soon as it came.

Maybe a week later Keith met Shiro. He had come into Keith’s school to talk about The Garrison; some flight school in the middle of the desert. Keith hadn’t been interested until Shiro presented them with a scarlet hoverbike that he flew. He was hooked. Shiro must have noticed his enthusiasm during the lecture as he happily spoke with Keith afterward.  
“How do I get in?” Shiro snorted at his bluntness,  
“The exam is in a couple of months, if you want I can give you the material you’ll need to study but there is also a physical examination-” Keith cut him off,  
“I’m fit.” Shiro nodded.

Keith ducked his head before speaking again, exhibiting the first signs of shyness Shiro had seen so far,  
“Could you- could you help me?” Shiro wanted to say no. He had a lot of work he needed to complete for the Kerberos mission and he couldn’t afford distractions. However, Shiro had always been soft-hearted towards kids and the boy’s demeanor screamed of someone not used to trusting or asking for help. Now that he had the courage to ask, Shiro couldn’t deny him.  
“Sure thing kid.” He ruffled the boy’s hair, remembering seeing it done in one of his soap operas.  
“No!” From that day on Shiro non-officially adopted him.

The following weeks were a frantic mix of mental recall, physical endurance and… research. No matter how exhausted Keith felt as he crawled into bed each night, he always took time to continue his private study on _‘how to remove a soulmate bond._ ’

There wasn’t much to go on and for a while, the only guaranteed method he could find was to kill them. There was no way in hell Keith was doing that. It didn’t matter how much he hated them. How much they had screwed up Keith’s life; there was no way he could take theirs. Also, he didn’t know where they lived.

Unfortunately, if he wasn’t going down that route, there were scarce few other options. It seemed that no matter where he looked, there was no information to be found. Eventually, it appeared luck was on his side and he stumbled across a paper concerning a small, government-led project regarding a new invention called a ‘soulmate repressor’.

They had been created for people working in high-risk jobs who had yet to meet their soulmates and thus didn’t wish to accidentally harm them. The repressor supposedly created a blockage through the soulbond and therefore prevented either person from feeling or taking the others pain. However, the project was still incredibly confidential and it would be years before repressors hit the mainstream market. Only those with good connections within the government could get their hands in one. Otherwise, repressors were rare and hopelessly expensive and it would be fucking impossible for Keith to look at one, never mind own one.

Or so he thought.

His success happened entirely by chance. As a result of his pursuit of further soulmate knowledge as well as his affinity towards conspiracy theories, he’d accumulated a wide range of online connections. Therefore, upon expressing his intense desire for a soulmate repressor, it was not long before he received a message from one of his followers. Apparently, due to the nature of their job they had been given a repressor but had no use for it as they had already met and spoken with their soulmate. This meant they were willing to pass it onto Keith, in exchange for the photographic evidence Keith had boasted proved the existence of Mothman. Keith didn’t have to think twice about it and once they had both set up bugs to make certain neither of them got cold feet, Keith was down three blurry photographs and up one piece of tech that would change his life.

Putting the thin black bracelet on for the first time felt _incredible_. Like he was taking back his own body. For the first time he could remember, he was in full control of himself. Keith was unashamed to admit he let loose a few tears. It was the happiest day of his life.

That’s not to say the following weeks weren’t the most challenging times of his life. Shiro was quite concerned about Keith’s sudden dip in training. Where before he’d sprung up after each knockdown, heedless of injury, Keith now required extra rests of longer times. That’s not to say Shiro wasn’t relieved by Keith’s newfound cautiousness, it was just odd after so many weeks of rash, impulsive fighting from the boy.

It was indeed tricky, at first, to cope with handling his own pain. He’d never realised before just how reckless he was with his own body. Another thing to blame on his soulmate. Sustained pain was the worst. Keith was no stranger to the initial hot rush of a cut or scrape, but never before had he had to endure the days, or weeks, of recovery. Suddenly, overexertion in Shiro’s training bore consequence and Keith was forced to suffer the resultant pains. However, every time the wandering, malevolent thought that - _maybe his soulmate wasn’t so bad after all_ \- wormed its way into his head, he clenched his teeth and sucked it up. Getting rid of his soulmate was the best thing to ever happen to him and if he had to struggle a bit to make it work, then so be it.

Soon enough, Keith was able to balance advancing in training with maintaining his health. Shiro was immensely pleased with him. The two of them had grown closer during the time Shiro spent instructing him. Keith had never had a proper family but he was fairly certain if he had, that was what it would have felt like. Shiro was the older brother Keith had always wanted - intelligent, supportive, and perfectly willing to put him in a headlock if he acted too bratty.

The day before the exam Shiro was fretting around, waving paper notecards and spitting out random pieces of advice, ranging from practical to pointless.  
“If they ask you to shade a box, shade it. There’s no point being lazy. The machine that reads the paper uses _optical mark recognition_ , so if the shading isn’t clear, it won’t mark it right”  
“Shiro.”  
“If you don’t know an answer, don’t panic. Just write something sensible and move on. Don’t waste time on it.”  
“Shiro.”  
“And if you drop something, don’t bend down and pick it up. The invigilator can do that for you but, if they see you move they can disqualify you as it could be seen as an attempt at cheating.”  
“Shiro.”  
“Actually, don’t move around at all. Just keep your head down and focus on the paper. That way there’s no way that you can be accused of _anything_.”  
“SHIRO!”

Shiro broke off from his ramblings to stare at Keith. Keith gave him a rare smile, something that only Shiro could receive.  
“Don’t worry so much. I’m going to ace this test. Seriously, there’s no way I could have had a better tutor. So _stop panicking._ ” Shiro gave an awkward cough.  
“Right. Sorry. You’ll be fine. Good luck.” He reached and ruffled Keith’s hair fondly. Keith pulled a face but didn’t move away.

Keith got in. Of course he did. Top in both the written and practical exams, meaning he was automatically placed in fighter class. Shiro had cried when he’d found out and Keith refused to stop teasing him about it for weeks. The two of them celebrated in Shiro’s small apartment with party poppers, streamers, and a children’s cake with a cartoon rocket on the top. Keith savored the time together, knowing Shiro was going on the Kerberos mission soon.

Still, at least for a short period of time, Keith could enjoy having a family.

Three months into Keith’s time at the Garrison, he lost that family. Shiro was gone. For days he locked himself in his room, refusing to leave. During that time he flew through the stages of grief in entirely the wrong order, swiftly transitioning from denial and sorrow, to rage. Four days after bolting his door shut, Keith stormed from his room and approached every person of importance he could find within the Garrison to demand an explanation for Shiro’s disappearance.

He was refused information by them all. As he was not a relative and held no power within the academy, he had no right to the information. The final straw was the response given to him by Iverson, telling him to calm down and that, _‘Whilst Shirogane will be missed, I’m sure there are plenty of suitable cadets that will be able to fill his shoes.’_

Keith had punched him. Hard.

How dare he have the nerve to suggest that Shiro was nothing more than a pilot. That he was so easy to replace and that no one should miss him because of it. The academy had had a single day of mourning, then continued like normal. Like that had been enough and that everything was alright now and everyone could move on with their lives. Keith felt sickened.

The Garrison expelled him at once. Said they had a no-tolerance policy for that kind of thing. Keith was glad. He would have left anyway. The romanticisms he had had about the place having vanished along with Shiro. He quietly packed his bags and left on Shiro’s prized red hoverbike. He figured no one else was going to be using it.

Keith couldn’t return to the Orphanage. He had grown as a person too much. He was afraid if he returned, all of that would be undone. Instead, he remained in a hut he’d found close to the Garrison on the day he’d left. He used his internet connections and hacking abilities to keep an eye on the happenings of the Garrison, as well as any and all information regarding the Kerberos mission.

For months he scoured the web, building machines in his spare time to monitor energy readings and the like. Until one day he was alerted to a massive wave of unknown energy emerging from a nearby cave formation. The caves in question were decorated in a range of coloured shapes and symbols that Keith could make no sense of. They just added to his suspicions about the mission and whilst Keith came no further to unraveling their mysteries, his list of unsolved puzzles grew longer the more he investigated.

Weeks turned to months as he continued searching for answers, until one night every machine he had went haywire, showing huge energy spikes around the Earth’s atmosphere. The size and shapes of the energy flow differed but they all dipped down in the same movement - towards the Garrison. With that information, Keith was on his hoverbike and moving towards the area.

The next few hours were a blur; running from the Garrison, meeting Pidge and Hunk and Lance and finding Shiro.

Finding Shiro.

Seeing him again and being able to talk to him again felt like a dream. In fact, it felt more unreal then the following experiences of entering a giant metal cat, leaving earth and discovering two human-like aliens called ‘Alteans’.

Luckily Keith had always been adaptable and as a result, he just ended up rolling with it. The universe was in danger. Got it. The reason being; a race of purple, furry cat people. Sure. Keith was supposed to fight these aliens inside of a metal lion and alongside two aliens, three strangers and someone he had thought to be dead for a year. Sounds fake but okay. Keith managed.

When it was revealed to the team that Allura and Shiro were soulmates, Keith was extremely happy for them. Considering Keith’s views on his own soulmate, people might be surprised but Keith was no monster. Just because he had his own issues, didn’t mean he would trample on someone else’s happiness. And those two, perhaps more than anybody, deserved happiness. Shiro, Keith knew, had spent a great portion of his life being a prodigy. Strong, handsome and unattainable. People unknowingly ostracised him, seeing him as more of a comic book character than an actual real-life person. They raised him high onto a pillar of his successes and left no room for anyone to join him. Shiro had told Keith, back on Earth, how he sometimes wished he had never joined the Garrison. How lonely he’d felt and how much he wished people would treat him normally.

Allura, however, was a princess. She wouldn't hero worship him for his accomplishments, only respect him. She had been brought up amongst aristocracy and nobility, so a talented pilot from Earth wouldn’t rose-tint her vision. That was what Shiro really deserved - someone who would stand with him as an equal, high on their own pillar rather than clutching to the base of his.

Allura too deserved this happiness. She had spent ten thousand years inside of a cryopod, only to find her planet has been destroyed and she was one of the last of her people. Keith couldn’t even imagine the kind of crushing loneliness and sorrow that would bring to a person. Nobody deserves to feel that. Therefore, the fact that the two of them had found one another was enough to shake Keith’s animosity towards soulmates and briefly allow him to bask in their shared joy.

Yet, it was another thing altogether when Allura suggested they should share information on their soulmates as a way of bonding. At her words, Keith had felt his blood run cold. This was a topic he had successfully evaded for years. Shiro had tried prying once, but when Keith had clammed up at the subject, he had stopped and not mentioned it again. This was a part of himself that not even _he_ was ready to deal with and it certainly wasn’t something that he was willing to share with people that he was still getting to know.

The walk to the training room went too quickly and soon they were seated in a circle. Keith found his hearing phase in and out, as one by one the people around him spoke about their soulmates. Hunk had one, Pidge didn’t. Coran wouldn’t and Shiro and Allura had one other. Then it was Lance’s turn and Keith chose to focus his attention on that, rather than the blood pumping through his ears. Lance would, predictably, go into a lengthy spiel about their soulmate and how great they were, hopefully giving Keith the time to get his head straight.

However, the metaphorical rug was yanked from his feet when, instead of doing any of that, Lance laughed and waved the idea off. Keith narrowed his eyes as Lance did that dumb, Lance thing of milking the attention on him for all it was worth. It was so irritating that, for a second, Keith forgot that that was exactly what he wanted from Lance. Yet, when Lance said something along the lines of, _‘I just really don’t want to talk about my soulmate, thanks._ ’ Keith had to call bullshit. As if Lance would ever not use an excuse to yap about himself. He was just doing theatrics for more attention. In fact, Keith more or less said that to him, fed up with his narcissism.  
“Since when have you _not_ wanted to talk about yourself?” At his words, Lance scowled and flushed angrily.  
“Since this was _not_ any of your business. Talk about _your_ soulmate, mullet!”

That really threw Keith. What was he supposed to say? What lie could he tell? Then, it occurred to him, he didn’t have to lie.  
“I don’t have a soulmate.” He was unable to completely mask the note of glee in his voice as he realised that that was, really, the truth. Keith watched Lance’s lip curl into an expression that he had never seen before on his face.

“Of course _you’d_ be happy about that.” The accusation in his voice was surprising. It left an unpleasant feeling in his gut and Keith wanted none of it.  
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Lance let out a laugh that was so unlike his usual one. It was a hollow sound that was a grim echo of what it should have been. It was cruel and bitter and Keith hated it.

“What, lone wolf Keith? Top pilot of the Garrison. Talented. Gorgeous. Bet you can’t think of anything worse than something as pathetic as a soulmate dragging you down. I’m sure you love being above it all!” The words hit harder than Lance could have ever known they would. And he was right, in a way. Keith _did_ love the solitude that came from the loss of his soulmate. Yet, the way Lance spoke; accusing Keith of something he had no evidence for, made Keith see red. How dare he so flippantly make assumptions on Keith’s life when he had no idea of the sufferings Keith had endured?

As the team questioned Lance on his soulmate, Keith felt his face grow dark. Any outrage the others had felt on his behalf vanished, as soon as Lance let out a few crocodile tears and choked out a little sob story and that was so _fucking typical_. Then, to find out that Lance _did in fact_  have a soulmate and that the whole thing was just a grab for attention, Keith was a little pissed.

At least the others somewhat shared Keith’s disdain for Lance’s melodrama. Pidge laughed whilst Shiro tried to placate him,  
“Lance, Hunk’s right. Are you sure you’re not just being dramatic?” Lance’s head snapped up from Hunk’s shoulder so quickly that Keith was afraid he would get whiplash, before he spoke to Shiro in a shaky voice.

“When I was fourteen my soulmate tried to kill me.”

As Lance flounced from the room, the paladins stayed in frozen silence, absorbing this new information. Finally, Keith gave a slightly forced laugh,  
“I knew he was going to be dramatic about it, but that was ridiculous.” Hunk snapped out of his shock and turned to face Keith,  
“Keith, can’t you see he was really upset? Having something like that happen to you must be horrifying!” Pidge shook her head in disbelief and echoed Keith’s laugh,  
“You don’t seriously believe him?” Hunk frowned, mentally squaring up in order to defend his best friend,  
“Of course I believe him, why wouldn’t I?” Pidge rolled her eyes,  
“Because his story makes no sense? How could his soulmate _‘try to kill him’”_ she made air quotations with her fingers,  
“if they’ve never met? First he tells us he has a soulmate, then that he doesn’t and now that he has again. Face it, it’s just Lance being Lance. Sure, it got a little out of hand, but I think he was just trying to make a joke, except no one found him funny. Don’t let him get to you, Hunk.”

Hunk frowned again and opened his mouth to retort, but Shiro stepped forward, cutting him off.  
“Guys, please. Don’t argue about this. Hunk, Pidge might have a point but until we’ve spoken to Lance, I don’t want anyone jumping to conclusions. We are a team and we should be able to trust one another. Yes, it might just have been a badly received joke or exaggeration but I, personally, don’t believe that Lance is the type of person to say something like that without a good reason.”

One by one the paladins nodded to Shiro’s words, some more reluctantly than others. However, before they could proceed any further than that, the Castle’s alarms sounded loudly, scaring everyone but Shiro and Allura.  
“Quickly paladins!” Allura’s voice rose above the noise,  
“To your lions.” Without any more delay, the group scrambled to suit up and enter their lions. As they ran, Keith half wondered whether Lance would show up.

When they radioed in, Keith was slightly ashamed of the presumptions he had made regarding his teammate. He should have known Lance well enough by now to realise he would never abandon the lives of the innocent because of personal problems. Keith felt a little sick by the realisation that he, in that position, might have. Shaking that last thought off, Keith dedicated himself entirely to the flying of his lion. Allura was feeding them information from the castle.

“Okay Paladins, this is not an offensive battle. The planet beneath you is named Li-huil and the Castle’s records of it show only that its surface sinks to incredibly low temperatures during its secondary planetary rotation. This is aided by the planet’s ice core. However, those were records from ten thousand Deca-Phoebs ago and tell a vastly different tale to the scans the Castle has just taken; implying Deca-Phoebs of surface tension from the intense cold. As a result, Li-huil’s surface is incredibly unstable. You can see the cracks coating the planet’s surface from here. The dark marks are from areas where the land has broken up completely and disintegrated.”  
“Understood Allura, what can we do to help?” Keith felt a surge of pride at the authority in Shiro’s voice. He had really grown into his role of leader.

“Currently the people of Li-huil are evacuating to its twin planet, which is already inhabited by two-thirds of the people’s overall population. Unfortunately, they are not capable of mass transit and do not have the resources to transport everyone. Luckily, the planet is not in critical condition yet and the Castle has calculated that it has two to three Movements left before it becomes entirely uninhabitable. I would like you all to use your lions to ferry the people across, whilst myself and Coran will do the same with the Castle. Li-huil has a relatively small population so I do not think it will take longer than a Quintant or two, as long as we work efficiently.”  
“Got it.”

Privately Keith thought there had to be a better way to do it. Some alien, Altean way that wasn’t so boring Keith wanted to bash his head onto Red’s dashboard. However, seeing as no other options presented themselves, the team soon got into a swing of picking up and transporting as many of the creatures as they could, in the shortest amount of time possible. It was dull work, especially in comparison with what Voltron was usually needed for. Nine times out of ten, all that was required was a few hours of fighting before they could all collapse in a sweaty heap on the Castle’s floor. This, on the other hand, required patience, something Keith was willing to admit was not his strong suit.

The creatures, Keith was told by Pidge, were called Vuhm and were extremely appreciative of the Paladin’s help. They spoke in high chitters that, for some reason, their Universal Translators did not work on and many stroked Keith’s hair upon entering and leaving. The first time it had happened, Keith had half raised his bayard before he was even aware of what was happening. The Vuhm in question had immediately removed its hand and stepped backward, despite Keith’s muttered apology. After that, he made a conscious effort to not react negatively when a Vuhm ran a clawed hand through his hair. At first, he’d been unsure of the gesture’s meaning but short glances around his lion showed him that the grooming was a common thing.

All of the Vuhm carried large manes of feathers that flowed from the tips of their heads to low on their backs. Although shapes and colours varied, every creature sported the sleek, soft looking feathers. Watching the Vuhm between trips, Keith concluded that the stroking was a comfort thing. The people did not appear to split into groups of friends or family, and instead mixed freely amongst one another, exchanging affectionate touches as naturally as breathing. Or whatever the Vuhm equivalent to breathing was.

It only took a couple of doboshes for each group to be transported but there was limited space inside of the lions and castle and a lot of Vuhm to be moved. However, after more Vargas than Keith could be bothered to count, the lions deposited the last remaining Vuhm. Allura had told them over radio that they would be staying for the next few days to negotiate an alliance but first, they were all to return to the Castle to rest.

So, after speaking to the leader of the Vuhm for the briefest amount of time possible, the team withdrew to the castle, allowed Shiro to give them a debrief no one listened to and then retreated to their rooms. Less than three seconds after entering his room, Keith happily collapsed onto his bed without changing out of his Paladin armor. That was a problem for Future Keith to deal with. In his sleep-hazed mind he knew that Lance would bitch at him for not changing and as that thought occurred to him, so did the idea that he had forgotten to do something important. However, for the life of him he couldn’t remember, so it was with a slightly uneasy mind that Keith drifted off to sleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So that's pt 2 (:
> 
> feel free to call me names in the comments


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey, it's me, ya boi.
> 
> *halfheartedly gestures towards chapter*
> 
> tadah

When the Castle’s alarm had sounded, Lance hadn’t thought twice about rushing towards the hangers and into Blue. Like hell he was going to risk people’s lives just because he was having a wobbly. The idea of disappointing Shiro, his childhood hero, also left a sick feeling in his chest. With that in mind, Lance felt a certain degree of hurt by the surprise in Shiro’s voice when Lance radioed in with the others. Still, he got over his shock quickly enough and soldiered on with his ever flawless plan of; ‘ _ if I pretend nothing’s wrong, eventually it’ll all go away.’  _ Lance could respect that. It would be a bit hypocritical of him not to, seeing as he’d spent most of his life ignoring his own problems in the hopes that they’d disappear.

 

Whilst they flew towards the planet, Allura gave them a brief summary of what they were meant to do, which was: not much. Lance was bored by the time she finished her explanation, which gave him a pretty good idea of what was in store for the next god-knows how many hours.

 

Perhaps the only good thing about the mission was that it did not require Voltron. Of course, normally Lance loved the feeling of shared power and connection with his teammates, but today he was doubtful any of them would be able to get it up. Lance grimaced at his mental choice of words. ‘ _ Get it up _ ’ made it sound like Voltron needed some sort of space Viagra to form and he  _ did not _ need to have that image in his head. 

 

However, on the  _ even brighter _ side; the Vuhm were an incredibly beautiful species. Lance was entranced by their feathers in particular and if he was in even a  _ slightly _ better mood, he would have attempted using some sweet pick up lines in the hopes of impressing some of them. Today, however, that hit a little too close to home. Everything just seemed to remind him of his soulmate.

 

Sometimes it was hard for Lance to know who he hated more; his soulmate, or the doormat of a person he used to be around them. Lance stopped that particular train of thought before he could dwell on it further and for the next few journeys, forced himself to think of other things.

 

_ ‘Is that Vuhm ruffling its feathers to seduce me, or is it just cold?’ _

 

_ ‘Will I ever be able to convince Pidge to have a spa night with me?’ _

 

_ ‘If I combined food goo with nunvil, would the two terrible flavours cancel each other out to create something edible?!”’ _

 

Eventually, his pitiful attempts at distracting himself were cut off by a voice in his head that sounded suspiciously like his mothers,  _ ‘Do not hide what is upsetting you, Pollito, that doesn’t help anyone. No one can help you unless they know what you need help with.’ _

 

God, he missed her. Lance decided then and there that he would tell the team about his soulmate. They deserved to know and it really wasn’t as dramatic as he was making it out to be. The only reason he was hiding it was because  _ he _ found it hard to talk about, and if that wasn’t selfish he didn’t know what was. He was putting his friend’s lives at risk because  _ his feelings were hurt _ , what kind of terrible person did that? He just needed to talk to them.

 

With that decision made, Lance continued transporting the Vuhm with renewed determination. He tried to talk to a few of them but his Universal Translator seemed to be jacked up. Ignoring that particular language barrier, Lance kept up a continuous babble of calming, encouraging words that the Vuhm would hopefully interpret as friendly. They seemed friendly enough themselves, quite a few of them petting and stroking his hair during flights. Lance found it oddly comforting but it made him feel a bit useless. He was supposed to be the one comforting them, not the other way around.

 

When, finally, the last of the Vuhm had been moved and all of the obligatory  _ Allura speaks for a stupidly long time about alliances _ time was over, Lance flew Blue back to the Lion’s Hangers. On the way he got a little distracted by some space dust so by the time he arrived back, the rest of the lions were already there and Lance assumed the others had made their way through the Castle. He was proven right when he entered the main room and found the rest of the team slumped across various areas of the room. Shiro and Allura were talking together on the stairs whilst Coran was apparently speaking to himself as he fiddled with a rotating device in his hands. Keith had managed to stretch across two whole sofas whilst Pidge and Hunk took the remaining one; Pidge lying entirely on top of Hunk. Lance smiled at the familiar sight and had almost physicked himself up enough to speak, when Shiro beat him to it with a friendly,

 

“Good work Lance. Okay I know this wasn’t one of our typical missions and required a bit more patience than usual-”   
“You can say that again.” Pidge groaned, accidentally elbowing Hunk in the stomach as she rolled over. Hunk  _ wheezed _ .

“But,” Shiro narrowed his eyes at Pidge, “These types of mission are just as, if not more, important than ones where we’re going in all guns blazing.” He stopped, looking at Lance, “Are you going to sit down?”

“Huh? Oh, yeah.”

 

Lance nestled himself into Hunk’s unPidged side and tried to pay attention as Shiro gave them a pep talk/run down, of the mission. As the speech continued, Lance was half relieved, half upset that nothing regarding his soulmate was brought up. 

 

When Shiro eventually sent them off to sleep, without giving Lance a second glance, the relief left and Lance was left feeling only hurt. Maybe the team hadn’t thought what he’d said about his soulmate was important. Maybe they didn’t care that Lance was so upset by it. Lance mentally smacked himself for thinking that, his team loved him more than anything. They wouldn’t  _ not care _ about something big that affected Lance. However, this left him with only one option; they didn’t consider this to be something big.

 

His team would have his back through anything but Pidge always knew when to call him out for being a drama queen. Perhaps this was just another one of those times. Maybe the team knew he was overreacting but, rather than make a big deal out of it, were just silently giving him the hint to grow up. Lance could completely understand that. His whole life had been so centered around his soulmate that it was entirely plausible that he had blown the issue out of proportion. Lance just needed to get a grip on himself and let the past go. They were in space for fuck's sake, he had bigger things to worry about.

 

With thoughts of turning over a new leaf in mind, Lance changed out of his armour and settled down to sleep. Tomorrow, he decided, if he refused to make a big deal out of it then everything would return to normal. His last conscious thoughts swirled somewhere across the lines of,  _ ‘I still have to apologise to Keith for what I said in the training rooms.’ _

  
  
  


 

 

If Lance wanted a distraction for him and his teammates, then his prayers had been answered. Allura had told the team during breakfast (Ooh, food goo again?! What a surprise!) that the next few days would be spent with the planet’s diplomats, discussing the exchange of supplies and distribution of weaponry and other aid. She continued talking about  _ ‘Utilizing the planet’s unique hydromagnetic carbicons’ _ and  _ ‘Perhaps being able to replicate the evolutionary advantages the Vuhm have in order to survive with their planet’s ice core,’ _ and whilst Lance couldn't understand half the things she was saying, it sounded exhausting. Luckily, Shiro, Coran and Allura were managing the diplomatic areas whilst Lance and the others (who Lance had the self-awareness to admit, were not so great at the ‘ _talking to others respectfully_ ’ thing) were told to mingle with the aliens planetside. Allura said it was to ‘ _ strengthen trust between the Paladins of Voltron and the Vuhm people _ ’ but Lance figured she just wanted them out of the way. That was fair.

 

Lance wasn’t sure whether it was a coincidence or not that doing so would split them all up, but for now, he would take what he could get. He needed some time to collect his thoughts and that was something he would prefer to do away from his teammates.

 

Lance McClain didn’t do things half-heartedly so the first opportunity that came, he began chatting with the locals. It was actually incredibly interesting to learn about the Vuhm people and their culture. Thankfully it hadn’t taken Coran very long to fix the problems with their Universal Translators - something about,  _ ‘The frequency the Vuhm speak to one another with is at a pitch the Castle hasn’t heard before but we’ll soon sort that out, won’t we?’  _ The translator was still a bit patchy, obviously, and for some reason kept mistranslating the word ‘have’ as ‘receive’ but was overall more than enough to bridge the gap of the language barrier.

 

The first thing Lance learned from the Vuhm people was that the shape and size of the feathers flowing down their backs held great cultural significance. The larger, diamond-shaped design were recognised as stronger or superior, whilst the smaller, triangular tapered feathers were viewed as weaker and of lesser importance. However, when Lance spoke with what he gathered were the younger generation of Vuhm, they seemed to disagree with this view; claiming that there was little to no difference in strength between the two. Lance didn’t know which group were right but from his knowledge and experiences of  _ human’s _ prejudices, he hoped that Vuhm treated one another fairly, no matter what type of feathers they had.

 

The feathers themselves seemed to have the same basic uses as facial expressions. Feathers were lifted upwards and spread if the Vuhm was relaxed and content, whilst drawn in feathers showed distrust or fear. Of course, there were intricate movements and nuances that displaced far more complicated emotions, but that was as far as Lance got with understanding them.

 

 

 

During the days spent on the planet, Lance spent a lot of time with a tall, sapphire blue feathered Vuhm named Qaelf. They’d approached him pretty early on; during the paladin’s first diplomatic day on the planet, saying they wanted to thank Lance personally for carrying them in the blue lion. Lance had been unable to reply, frozen in awe in the presence of the gorgeous alien.

 

Their body was covered in thousands of shimmering scales ranging in shades of baby blue to midnight. Three eyes peered down at him in glowing cerulean shades and deep blue feathers sprung from their head and down their back like a Khimar. They were absolutely stunning and they’d just  _ thanked him _ . Thanked him, and also, maybe, seduced him in the process. Consequently, all the Vuhm got in response to his gratitude were uncertain splutters and a blushing blue paladin. Qaelf hadn’t seemed to mind his less-than-intelligent response and had offered to show Lance great sights around the planet. Lance had happily agreed.

 

The two got on brilliantly. Despite some confusions every now and then from language barriers, (the two had attempted to try pick up lines on one another and had only succeeded in totally mystifying themselves; Lance was still uncertain whether Qaelf calling his eyes ‘ _ Starluminite borders _ ’ was a compliment or not.) it seemed they had very similar personalities. In fact, by their third day of meeting, Qaelf allowed Lance to touch his lower feathers. This was a far more intimate act than touching head feathers, which was acceptable even for strangers, and Lance was  _ honoured _ . The texture of the feathers was unlike anything he’d ever felt before, impossibly soft and silky but with such a strength in their core that Lance doubted they could be broken by anything. Qaelf shyly admitted afterward that touching feathers like that was an act usually reserved for lovers.

 

Lance, face brilliantly flushed, offered to show Qaelf the ‘human kiss’ as compensation. Qaelf very much enjoyed that custom and from then on, showered Lance with innocent pecks to the lips any chance he had. This, of course, blew any chance Lance had of keeping their friendship secret from the team, as well as providing Pidge with blackmail material to last for years. It was worth it.

 

 

 

 

One thing Lance was extremely glad for was that no one tried to bring up his soulmate again. Hunk had tried but Lance had given him puppy dog eyes until he left it alone. Pidge had been in the room at the time and had joined their unspoken agreement not to talk about it. Shiro, Coran, and Allura weren’t a problem since they were busy with diplomacy stuff, whilst Keith had been avoiding him since their argument.

 

 

 

 

Sometime during the second day on the planet, Lance became aware that Shiro was watching them, face pursed as if he wanted to say something. But just as the man opened his mouth, an expression somewhere between guilt and horror crossed his face and he negated to continue. Lance had no idea what it had been about but when Shiro made no comments about Qaelf or himself, he’d shrugged it off.

 

The other Paladins had no problem with the two of them hanging out. In fact, Pidge had flat out told him,

“Yes, go and make out with bird brain. I love you Lance but I would rather dance classical ballet for Zarkon than allow you to attempt mass diplomacy.” Lance couldn’t argue with that.

 

Pidge was like the little sisters he already had; short, sharp-tongued, and all too eager to tell him when he fucked up. Lance loved that girl. He was also low-key terrified of ever getting on her bad side but some things were better kept unsaid.

 

Hunk, of course, had no qualms regarding Qaelf,

“Lance, I know you’ve been down lately and I don’t know exactly what it is, but I know there's something going on between you and your soulmate. I’m not going to make you talk about if you don’t want to but I want you to know that you’re an amazing person and nothing anyone can say or do to you will stop that from being true, alright?” Lance had nodded mutely at him, throat oddly choked up.

 

Lance strongly believed that everyone deserved a Hunk in their lives. That boy shone like a sun and did no wrong. Well, one time he’d used all of Lance’s expensive face cream 'cause he thought it was motor oil - don’t ask - but that was in the past and Lance had forgiven him for it. Mostly. Really though, back in the Garrison Lance only had to say the word and the two of them would be bundled under thick layers of blankets, eating ice cream and watching Disney movies. Lance said the word a lot. What could he say? - The Garrison had been an important experimental phase for Lance; the first time he’d really had to consider being with someone other than his soulmate. Lance had dated boys, girls, and a talented musician named Kay that didn’t use either pronouns.

 

None of his relationships had lasted very long. When spending time with them, Lance could feel himself self-sabotaging, pushing them away before they could leave by their own choice. He’d remained friends with many of them, but the romance part had never seemed to work out. It was Hunk that finally suggested Lance ease up on his frivolous dating. It wasn’t good for him. Lance had to agree; just because he’d realised that he was no longer tied to his soulmate, did _not_ mean he was required to find somebody new. He was his own person and that had to come before anything else.

 

That’s not to say he completely switched off his charm. Lance was a people person after all. Plus, he liked flirting; it was nice to be able to please someone with just a few words. Or irritate. Lance mostly irritated people. Although the incident with Nyma had sobered him up a lot. From now on, Lancy Lance would be using  _ no _ handcuffs until there was an established safeword and hand gesture. Safe, sane and consensual was how you did it kiddos.

 

His flirting around Allura had dissolved into nothing more than playful teasing. At this point she was like another older sister to him. Plus, she and Shiro had that whole;  _ I would die to protect you but I’m too shy to hold your hand _ , thing going on and Lance wouldn’t want to get in the way of that. He and Pidge found it too funny.

 

With all that said, he’d been surprised to find that he’d attracted Qaelf with nothing more than average flying. Yet he was glad he had, although Keith’s reaction to them was surprising.

 

During the day, when Lance and Qaelf hung out, he said nothing, acting like his usual emo, dark knight rises, mullety self. However, when the team returned to the Castle he'd make loud comments about how, ‘ _ We must remember to stay on our guard. Just because they are possible allies, does not mean we can trust them.’  _ as well as asking Hunk if cooked Vuhm would taste like chicken. 

 

Lance wondered fondly if Keith though his concern was subtle. Nevertheless, it brought a warm feeling to his heart. It was common knowledge that the two of them weren’t the best of friends (something they’d been slowly improving upon) but it was nice to know that, no matter how much they might bicker, Lance could trust for Keith to have his back.

 

He'd ended up not apologising for what he’d said to Keith during the ‘soulmate incident’. That didn’t mean he wasn’t still guilty about what had happened, it was just that everyone had unanimously chosen to not mention it again and Lance did  _ not _ want to be the one to open that wound back up. It was better to just leave it be.

  
  
  


 

 

Roughly five days after the negotiations had started, the alliance had been finalised and the team were readying to leave. Lance was actually far more upset than he had expected to be, having gotten on so well with Qaelf. Of course, he’d know from the beginning that he wouldn’t be staying on the planet for very long but the two of them had bonded a lot during their short time together. Qaelf had shown him foreign plants and creatures, they’d shared information about their cultures, and Qaelf had performed for Lance a, frankly terrifying, mating ritual.

 

As a result, when the rest of the team were already situated at the bottom of the Castle’s ramp, getting ready to leave the planet, Lance was still exchanging farewells with the alien. The two were trading one final hug when Lance, in his heartache forgetting proper feather etiquette, ran his fingers down Qaelf’s back one final time. Qaelf let out an involuntary trill and the surrounding crowd gave a united gasp, several young Vuhm having to be shielded from their public indecency. Lance dropped his hand away immediately and began stammering apologies despite Qaelf’s glare having no real fire.

 

In retaliation, the alien dipped Lance low and kissed the living daylights out of him, wrapping his long, velvety tongue around Lance’s own. Dimly, Lance could hear Pidge wolf-whistling but the majority of his attention was centered on the cool movement of Qaelf’s mouth. When he was finally released from the Vuhm’s arms, Lance couldn’t help stumbling over his own feet, flushed face aimed at the floor, almost missing Qaelf’s final call of,

“Goodbye Blue Paladin Lance. Thank you for all that you showed me.” Accompanied by what must have been the Vuhm equivalent of a smirk at Lance’s still dazed expression.

 

“Lance,” Allura’s voice; half amused, half exasperated, broke the bubble the two had surrounded themselves in. Lance nodded to her in recognition, gave Qaelf a final private smile, and then staggered over to his sniggering teammates. Thankfully they had the decency not to speak until they were inside the Castle, away from Vuhm ears. Shiro was the first to speak, sighing,

  
“Lance. That was not appropriate for a Paladin of Voltron.” Lance floundered, distressed by the disappointment in his leader’s voice,

“But  _ he _ kissed  _ me _ !”

“You touched his feathers.” Shiro countered, “For the Vuhm that’s a very intimate and  _ personal  _ act, kind of like sex for humans. Come on Lance, this was one of the first things Coran briefed us about. You're lucky they seemed to enjoy it, that could have been seen as assault.” Lance gaped at him, not processing anything past the word ‘sex’.

“Whaaaat?! I lost my space virginity! Fuck. Oh shit, I didn’t know. Does that make me a furry? Or a feathery? Holy shit, I’m a feathery! What do -”

 

Shiro didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. Of course Lance hadn’t listened to Coran’s briefing - heck, Shiro himself hadn’t really been paying attention - but to do something like that. It wouldn’t hurt the alliance or anything serious but it made Lance look pretty bad. As Lance continued to babble hysterically, Shiro decided that he could live with that. There were worse things the Vuhm could think of him and information like that wouldn’t make its way off of the planet. Lance’s reputation was safe. For now. Shiro could swear blind that the patch of white on his head was growing solely from having to take care of those idiotic kids.

 

“-I didn’t assault them I swear! They’ve let me touch their feathers before. It’s ju-”

“That Vuhm allowed you to touch their feathers?” Coran’s incredulous voice interrupted Lance’s gabbling. Lance nodded and, much to his horror, Coran  _ winked _ at him.

“They must have been very fond of you then. The touching of feathers is an act of intimacy that some couples take Deca-Phoebs to build up enough trust to do.”

“Then why the hell would  _ anyone _ let  _ Lance _ touch their feathers?!” Keith broke in disbelievingly. Lance scowled at him,

“What? Are you jealous, Mullet?” Keith snorted,

“No. Why the hell would I  _ ever _ let  _ you _ touch my feathers?” The room fell into silence for a short period of time before Pidge said, in a long-suffering voice,

“Keith. You don’t have feathers.”

  
  
  


 

 

The next few months flew by, cluttered with alliances, new planets and battles. Sometimes all at once. Asides from the odd passing comment, usually regarding Shiro and Allura, the topic of soulmates was not brought up during that time, simply because they were all working so hard. The only really memorable incident was when Shiro unnecessarily took a small wound from Allura, offending her so greatly that she ordered Shiro, as the black Paladin, to wear the native clothing of the planet they had just saved. This happened to be a long, shimmery, lamp shaped drape, and whilst the eleven foot Cyrua rocked the look, Shiro looked ridiculous. Pidge had enough blackmail material to last a lifetime and Shiro swore on hands and knees that in the future he would only take on an injury if he was better equipped with healing it than Allura. Allura had, grudgingly, accepted his apology.

 

 

 

 

 

Voltron was needed all across the universe and the team was so busy that Lance almost didn’t have time to feel homesick.

 

Almost.

 

Most of the time Lance could ignore the ache in his chest, but on the days when it all felt like it was too much, he’d talk to Hunk and the team would have a sleepover night. That sounded fancier than it actually was. All they did was drag their bedding into the main room and chat together. Despite their superior technology, Alteans had never really grasped the idea of movies, still, it was just as entertaining to watch their documentary-like rotating holograms that gave vivid descriptions of aliens from all across the cosmos. Lance was ninety percent sure a couple of the ones they’d seen were Coran trolling, but then again; space was fucking weird. The point was, the Paladins were stronger than ever; gaining more allies, winning battles faster and with more control. That sort of thing.

 

And then everything went to shit.

 

It was the Galra’s fault. Honestly, most things were those days. They were in a battle to protect the planet Kioo and on the whole, it was going alright. Well, it was less of a battle and more of a recovery mission. See - the planet’s energy source all came from a huge stone that held an immense electro-current energy. As in, it could easily power two or three more planets the same size as Kioo. Allura believed the Galra wanted to divide the gem up and use the shards to power their spaceships. Lance thought that was quite a smart idea but didn’t voice that thought as, contrary to what Pidge might think, he wasn’t completely brainless.

 

More importantly, the  _ Kito Johari _ people that inhabited Kioo had the same genetic makeup as the gem in question. (When Lance had said that the human equivalent to this would be keeping a ziplock bag of skin and organs in the White House, Shiro had said he wasn't allowed to contribute anymore. Apparently, a sense of humour wasn’t needed in space.) Anyway, this meant the power the jewel held could be channeled through the people and into the planet’s crystalline core. Therefore, the planet would not lose the power of the gem, but the Galra would be unable to utilize it for themselves.

 

Damn, Allura was brilliant. She deserved a raise.

 

The only problem was that the Galra had already infiltrated the temple and were attempting to remove the crystal. This became less of a problem when the  _ Kito Johari _ they were communicating with, smugly told them that it would take a long time for the Galra to remove the crystal by force. Apparently, if the crystal felt threatened, it would sprout thick tendrils all the way down to the planet’s core. Lance was only slightly freaked out by the implications that the crystal was alive. Space was terrifying.

 

From there, it hadn’t taken the team long to land planetside and reach the temple. There were Galra surrounding the entrance but Keith did a fucking terminator on their asses and knocked them out before Lance could even lift his bayard. That wasn’t ‘cause Lance was useless, if he had  _ known _ there was going to be Galra, he could've taken them down easily. Keith was just a reckless idiot.

 

The next ten to fifteen minutes were terrifying and afterward, Lance couldn’t have recalled what had happened if his life depended on it. Well, there was a lot of fighting. Pidge swore a lot and Shiro spent half the time telling her off about it, and the other half cussing just as loud. Hunk apologised every time he disarmed a Galra and Keith was a goddam  _ machine _ .

 

When they finally reached the main room of the temple, they were sweaty, covered in blood, and exhausted. And alarmed. Looking at the crystal, they were alarmed. Well, Lance was at least. It was blood red and the size of a quarter, settled between the legs(?) of, presumably, a statue of a  _ Kito Johari _ . Lance decided then and there that he would not be having a conversation alone with  _ any _ of the  _ Kito Johari _ , no matter how cute they were.

 

The statue was about ten foot tall and pearly translucent. The skin of the  _ Kito Johari _ glittered pastel blues and greens and whilst there was no discernable clothing, thousands of jellyfish-like tentacles hung down below the neck. Just looking at it, the statue seemed to sway in the temple’s dim lighting. The team remained unmoving in mute horror until Pidge broke their trance by marching forward and removing the gem with a loud, squelchy pop.

 

“Come on. This place is fucking creepy.” With that said, they began cautiously making their way over to the area Allura had instructed them to arrive at once they had recovered the crystal. As they traveled Shiro gave them the usual after-battle run down.

“I can see no one has any major injuries but is anyone bleeding? We don’t know what kind of alien illnesses we can catch. Remember, there is no heroism in tetanus.” At that, Keith had reluctantly spoken up.

“I think one of the soldiers cut me at the entrance.” He peeled back one (ugly) leather glove to show a small but rather deep gash across his hand. Shiro made a sympathetic noise,

“Does it hurt?” Keith shook his head.

“Okay then. Coran can bandage that when we return to the castle or, if it looks really bad, you can go in a pod for a couple of hours, alright?” Keith grunted, like the caveman he was.

 

“Awwww, mullet’s got a boo-boo. Want me to kiss it better?” Lance crooned in Keith’s ear, shit-eating grin firmly plastered onto his face. Keith looked pissed for a couple of seconds before his expression morphed into a look of concern,

“Lance, is that a spot on your forehead?” Lance’s hands flew to his face, running fingers across the smooth skin in an attempt to find the alleged spot. When he found nothing, he turned back to Keith who was trying not to laugh; shoulders shaking as his hands covered his mouth. Lance ignored the brief, intrusive thought that Keith looked cute like that and instead gave an overdramatic huff and moved to walk with Hunk instead.

  
  
  


Allura was already at the meeting place when they arrived, having sorted out an alliance. The  _ Kito Johari _ were just as terrifying as Lance had expected; too many tentacles and not enough friendly smiles. Luckily, as grateful as the people were for their help, they were anxious to get Voltron off of their planet. The ceremony they would have to perform to transfer the crystal’s power was one they wanted to keep private and time was of the essence. As a result, the team stayed for less than a Varga before returning to the Castle.

  
  
  


They had been inside the Castle for approximately two doboshes, when Keith spoke in a quiet voice and ruined any chance Lance had for getting a good nights sleep.

“Uh, Shiro. I think it’s got worse.” There was a brief period of universal  _ ‘huh? _ ’ as everyone looked around, wondering what the hell Keith meant by  _ ‘it’ _ . Then he lifted his hand to show it had swollen to twice its previous size and was throbbing moss green. _Yep, that'd be it._

 

Keith was muttering something about poisoned blades whilst the rest of the team panicked and Coran calmly led them down to the med room. The minutes following were tense and silent as Coran ran a worrying amount of tests whilst everyone else stood awkwardly in the corner.

 

When Coran told them it was just a fast acting but easily cured toxin, there was an audible sigh of relief. All Keith needed was some of Coran’s (slightly suspicious looking) medicinal herbs and a trip to the pods and he would be alright. This was reassuring for them all as Keith’s eyes already held a kind of hazy fog and his mouth was slack in a way that wasn’t normal for him. Lance wouldn’t like to admit it but he was worried for his rival.

 

 

Impressively, in all of his deliriousness, Keith attempted to protest the loss of a thin black bracelet that wrapped around his wrist, now cutting off the circulation. However, in his weakened state, he stood no chance against Coran, who sawed it off and then continued rubbing dubious looking liquids onto his hand.

 

 

 

The room was so tense and panicked that no one noticed Lance jerk back like he’d been shot and then bolt from the room. He sprinted through the castle, operating on muscle memory alone until he reached his room. Once there, he locked the door behind him and collapsed in the far corner of the room, wrapping his arms tightly around his body. Back in the med room, he had felt something he hadn’t felt in over three years.

 

His soulmate.

 

And, for the first time, he had made no attempt to take away their pain.

 

_ ‘No’  _ thought Lance, a sick feeling in his stomach,  _ ‘Not their pain. Keith’s pain.’  _ Because, if the still prickling feeling in his hand told him anything, it was that Keith Kogane was his soulmate.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yh I kinda got carried away w/ the fluff but did you see my
> 
> a n g s t
> 
> at the end?


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> who's ready for some P A I N ?!?

_Keith watched the colours spiral across the inside of his eyelids. They were pretty. He liked the red swirl most. How it danced and weaved around the others, moving in its own unique directions. It reminded him of Red, his lion. Yeah, just like Red. He should tell her that. It was important. She was his red swirl. Fast and beautiful. Yeah, he shou-_

 

A slight whooshing noise was the only warning he had before he was plunged back into the cruel reality of consciousness. Keith’s legs buckled beneath him as they were suddenly forced to carry his weight and he fell heavily onto Shiro.

 

He blinked lethargically as Shiro anxiously gave him Maddocks questions. Everything was too bright and over-saturated, like he was looking through a colour filter. Keith hated the pods. They left him disorientated and dulled his reflexes. Also sleepy, Keith stifled a yawn. It was true the pods accelerated your body’s healing rate, but that came at the cost of fine motor skills.

 

When Keith had eventually answered enough questions correctly to assure Shiro he _hadn’t_ suffered a major concussion, the team leader backed off to allow the rest of the team to greet him. As a rule, they’d established fairly early on that no one was to wake up from a pod alone. Asides from it being fairly rude, it assured the person leaving the pod that they were out of danger and everyone was okay. Keith could recall, maybe two times when someone woke up alone. One, of course, was Lance because they’d been distracted measuring the difference between ‘seconds’ and ‘ticks’, whilst the other had been Pidge, as everyone had fallen asleep in front of her pod. (Pidge had thought it was hilarious.)

 

Therefore, once he’d shaken off the initial pod vertigo, it was no surprise to Keith to see the relieved faces of his teammates. What _was_ troubling, was that Lance was not with them. Keith scanned the room, wondering if the boy was in his own pod, but to no luck. He’d intended to ask straight away but Hunk had mentioned food and Keith was _starving_. He reasoned that no one in the group appeared worried enough for Lance to have been in any kind of trouble. Still, on the way to the food goo room, he slipped in a question about it to Hunk, hopefully without sounding too concerned. If Lance caught wind that he’d been worried, he’d never hear the end of it.

 

Hunk seemed hesitant to answer,

“I think he’s in his room. He left sometime when we were getting you in the pod.” Keith’s face fell and Hunk hurried to explain his words,

“I think he was really worried about you. He’s protective of his friends. In the Garrison he always hated it when I got injured, I don’t think he likes the sight of blood.” Keith couldn’t help but feel a rush of relief at Hunk’s words. Over the months he and Lance had really bonded. _Even if some moments had been ‘forgotten’_. And Keith valued Lance’s friendship. He made a mental note to talk to the boy later. He was incredibly touched that Lance seemed to care about him to that degree but he didn’t want to cause him any unnecessary worry.

 

As Keith ate, Shiro explained to him that he’d been in the pod for the previous night and most of the morning. He’d been reluctant to let Keith train so soon after exiting but Keith was slowly wearing his resolve down. According to Coran, in the higher training levels the room offered different terrains and climates, and just as he was discussing those possibilities with Shiro, a sudden, paralysing memory resurfaced.

 

His restrictor.

 

His restrictor had been taken.

Clutching at his wrist only confirmed its absence.

“Keith, are you alright?” Shiro’s concerned voice cut into his thoughts.

“My bracelet,” he muttered, eyes scanning the food goo room, as if hoping there’d be a neon sign announcing its whereabouts.

“Where’s my bracelet?” Even he could hear the rising panic in his voice.

 

“My apologies, number four. I had to remove it in order to gain access to your hand. It was cutting off blood circulation in your body. Was it of importance?” Keith brushed aside the guilt clear in Coran’s voice. _‘Of importance?’_ That was a fucking understatement. He _needed_ it. There was no way in hell he was going to go back to how it was before. Keith felt his breathing seize. What if his soulmate just continued what they’d been doing before? What if they took _everything_ away again?

 

He frantically rolled his sleeves up to check for marks. Cuts or bruises. There was nothing there - of course there wasn’t, he’d just been in the pods - there was no way to tell. He ignored Shiro’s questions and dodged the arm that reached to grab him as he lunged towards the table and picked up the foot long, sharp-edged prism they’d been using as a knife. Before anyone could stop him, he drew it shallowly across his forearm.

 

The cut bled sluggishly but did not fade.

 

Unfortunately, he was prevented from making any further observations because Shiro tackled him to the ground. Keith landed harshly on his back, feeling the combined weights of himself and Shiro, that did not let up until Shiro had wrestled the knife from his grip. Shiro stood up as soon as he’d got hold of the knife, moving it away from Keith who remained on the floor, more than a little taken aback.

“Keith, what the hell was that? Are you alright? Why the fu- Why would you do that?!” Keith was too unnerved to think up a decent lie, instead blurting out,

“I was testing a theory” as he unsteadily got to his feet.

“What _theory_ ?! Is it possible to you put yourself _back_ in the pods in less than a varga?”

“No..”

He knew Shiro deserved answers, yet he was unable to give them. How could he, when he didn’t understand what was going on himself? What was he meant to think? His soulmate had always taken his injuries, no matter what.

“Well, what was that then?” Shiro wasn’t letting it go. However, Keith was saved from answering by the familiar sound of the Castle’s alarms.

 

The demand for Voltron had steadily increased as more and more of the universe sought help to fight against the Galra. Allura insisted this was a good thing as, _the more planets that have heard about Voltron and their actions, the more people will try to rise up against the Galra_. Keith could see how that was true but he was more inclined to side with Lance who said, _Yeah, that’s all great when you put it like that, but we’re just five kids who aren’t really sure what we’re doing and the whole universe is apparently relying on us._ At the end of the day ( _quintant??_ ) it didn’t really matter as they would try to help anyone that asked for it regardless. Keith tried to slip out towards the hangers as Allura called for them to enter their lions, but he was stopped by Shiro.

 

“Alright, we can speak about whatever that was later, but there’s no way you’re fighting right now. You’ve just come out of a pod and I’m not confident that you’re in a stable place just now.” Shiro seemed adamant in his decision but Keith _needed_ to be out there. He needed to work himself into an exhaustion so that when he returned to the Castle, all he would be able to do is collapse on his bed. The _last_ thing he wanted was time to stew and think about what had happened.

 

“Shiro, we’re defenders of the universe, I can’t just _not fight._ Look, I promise I’ll explain later but there’s nothing wrong with me. I don’t want to hurt myself, that was about something else. I’m alright to fight. We can’t form Voltron with one lion down.” Shiro studied his face dubiously as if searching for a lie, but the continuing screech of the alarm made his decision for him. He gave a resigned sigh.

“Just take care of yourself out there. It’ll be dangerous to put you back in the pod so soon. The universe needs you in one piece.” Keith nodded, then dashed off towards Red. He could really do with her presence in his head; she had a way of understanding him. She never tried to talk him out of his anger, but she would listen and offer her advice. Sure, it wasn’t always applicable; she was a ten-thousand-year-old metal lion and her way of dealing with people she didn’t like was, ‘Kill them’. However, the fact that she cared enough to try was all that was important to Keith.

 

On the other hand, she was also a stubborn, childish mess. She had no impulse control, liked to blast random alien music in Keith’s head during battles, and had a weird obsession with Lance. Like, Keith could admit the boy had a nice ass; he wasn’t blind, but was it _really necessary_ to mention it _every_ time he walked past?! Suggestive comments aside, Keith loved his girl. He liked to think of her as a kind of immature, useless, adoptive older sister.

  
  


His useless, adoptive older sister had a potty mouth. As Keith soared over cruisers, firing Red’s cannons, she projected a series of words into his head that all essentially meant ‘fuck’. Keith couldn’t disagree with what she was saying but it wasn’t helpful.

 

The battle was hard - not the hardest they’d ever had, but difficult in a way they hadn’t had to experience before. They were missing a lion and it's paladin. More specifically, the blue lion and Lance.

 

Keith was uneasy about their absence. He’d often said that nothing short of death would stop Lance from charging headlong into battle to protect people, so his worry was not unjustified. Still, the team fought on as best they could, until a lucky hit from Hunk knocked out the telecommunicator from the squadron they were fighting. Pidge had used a lot of big, sciency words to explain but what it boiled down to was the long, eggplant coloured box on the side of one of the Galra ships was what allowed them to communicate with one another. Once it had been destroyed, the fleet dispersed.

 

From there, the weary and worried team landed planetside to meet up with Allura who was already speaking to its inhabitants. Apparently the people of planet, whatever - Keith didn’t particularly care - were very grateful and whilst Allura promised to speak with them later about an alliance she told them, ‘ _Voltron currently has an important issue to address back in our main ship. There is nothing to be feared but we need to deal with it as soon as possible.’_

 

“Agree.” Said the alien Keith assumed was in charge, “We were rumoured that there is five of you shuttles.” Their voice pierced the air in a pitch that could cut glass. It got on Keith’s nerves. They needed to return to the Castle _now_ , not play nice with a planet that offered them no supplies or military advantage. Of course, he kept his thoughts to himself. Allura would sucker punch him if he didn’t. If Keith was scared of anything, it was Allura’s god-like wrath.

 

Finally, after thirty achingly slow dobosh’s, Allura managed to strategically disentangle them from the alien’s questioning and the team were able to make a hurried return to the Castle.

 

Alarmingly, Allura began apologising as they walked; looking more agitated then Keith had ever seen her.

“I’m so sorry, we wanted to find Lance but Coran and I were occupied with the battle. We were a lion down so the Castle had to make up for the lack of firepower and the weapons require at least two people to operate them.” She gave an irritated huff,

“Then, once the fighting was finished, the leader of the Doelilnou tribe demanded to see us and refused to let either of us stay in the Castle for ‘safety reasons’. The Castle’s scanners say that there have been no breaches to its security so it's not possible for something to have attacked him, but there must have been something seriously wrong for Lance to have not reported in and I should have been able to- to contact- or to help- or…” She stopped, drawing in a slow breath as if to calm herself.

 

Keith felt terrible, she was obviously distressed but he had no idea how to comfort her. Luckily, Shiro was naturally gifted at that sort of thing.

 

“Allura, none of this is your fault. You did a brilliant job in that situation, but we don’t expect you to work miracles. There was _no way_ you could have reached Lance, and anyway, he can't be in any grave danger. Like you said, there have been no breaches and the Castle is incredibly well protected; he probably just slept through the Castle’s alarm. Or, er, maybe he has space flu.” No one laughed at Shiro’s attempts to cheer them up but Allura seemed to relax slightly.

  
  
  


Upon entering the Castle, they walked straight to the main room where Shiro began to instruct them to split up to search for Lance. His efforts were proved unnecessary as Lance wandered through the door, apparently unharmed.

 

Keith was on guard. Lance’s eyes were bloodshot and his hair tousled - as if he’d been gripping it with his hands - yet, there was _nothing_ about his demeanor to suggest he was unfit to fly. It was Allura who spoke to him first,

“Lance, are you alright? Where the quiznack were you?!” Her face was taut and angry but Keith recognised her voice as the same one Shiro used back in the Garrison days when Keith had done something particularly reckless.

 

Lance payed her no notice and stepped towards Keith, whose hand had drifted subconsciously to his, now bare, wrist. Once he had seen that Lance was safe, his thoughts had immediately returned to the missing, black band. He desperately hoped that Coran hadn’t disposed of whatever scraps of material remained. Perhaps Pidge would be able to synthesise a replica.

 

Deep down he knew that that was unrealistic and, even so, for Pidge to agree to something like that he’d have to spill everything about his soulmate. He also knew that he didn’t care. Anything to prevent that feeling of helplessness from consuming him again. If it would stop his soulmate from _ever_ having any power over him again, then he would happily dredge up every painful memory for his teammates.

 

He was so lost in thoughts of the past, that he was taken aback when he realised just how close he and Lance were. Up close, Lance looked even worse. Smudgy circles were fingerprinted underneath his eyes, which were red and tired.

 

And glaring at him.

 

Glaring at him in a way he hadn’t done since their first few weeks in space. No, that wasn’t right. Back then Lance had disliked him, sure, but not to this degree. He’d never looked at Keith with such unbridled hatred before. It was disturbing.

  


“You have a soulmate.” Lance’s voice cracked on the final word and Keith felt a cold shiver run through his body, as if someone had doused him in ice. How did he know?

 

“Lance? Keith? What the _fuck_ is going on with you two?!” Pidge sounded an impressive mixture of scared, worried and altogether pissed off, yet neither of them answered her, stuck in their impromptu staring contest.

 

Keith could feel his heart ricocheting around his chest; threatening to escape through his mouth. Still, he answered with equal aggressiveness.

“I _don’t have_ a soulmate.” Lance made a sharp, grating sound that might have been a laugh,

“Then why were you wearing a restrictor?”

 

Keith felt himself shaking at the confrontation. How did Lance know this? Why was Lance doing this? It had nothing to do with him. Why was he making Keith relive all those years of _hurt_?

 

The rest of the team was staring at Keith with a collection of fear and curiosity; each of the paladins were intelligent enough to have heard of a restrictor and Coran and Allura were always excited to learn about human commodities. Lance continued to stare at him.

  
  


Keith was mad.

 

Keith was _so_ mad. Lance had pushed him and he was mad and since _when_ had Keith been applauded for his level-headedness? If Lance wanted him to talk, then he would fucking talk.

 

“I didn’t have a _soulmate_ , I had an abuser. Someone that caused me more pain than anyone else in my life.” He refused to look at anyone but Lance, communicating with his eyes as much as his voice.

“They _hurt_ me. They caused me pain. They stopped me feeling safe in my _own fucking body_ , and because of them I wanted to _kill myself_ just to make it all STOP!” He could feel his voice rising in volume but couldn’t bring himself to care enough to stop it.

“I wish they’d died back then. I wish they’d left me forever and I wish it’d _hurt_ them. I wish they’d been forced to feel just _a bit_ of the pain that I WENT THROUGH!”

 

The words burned his throat with their acidity and Keith _relished_ their feel. The room was silent and he took the time to savour the echoes of the words he’d kept bottled up inside for so long. He watched Lance with a sick sense of accomplishment.

 

Lance didn’t meet his gaze; head bowed towards the floor whilst his hands clenched at his sides. His shoulders appeared to be shaking slightly and when he spoke it sounded unmistakably _wet_ , as if the words themselves were dripping with his emotion.

“Why do you hate them?”

 

Keith could have screamed. Wasn’t it _obvious_? Did Lance really need it _spelled out_ for him?

“They made my life _hell_.”

 

It was only then that Lance looked up. His eyes were cold and empty, despite the steady flow of tears rolling down his face.

“And what about theirs?” His voice sounded brittle and pained in a way Keith couldn’t understand.

“Wha-”

“What did  _you_ do to _their_ life?” The question hung in the silent room and was left unanswered. Lance continued speaking in a dangerous tone.

 

“Do you seriously think they did all that to _hurt_ you? You think it was done out of hatred? That they spent _years_ mutilating their own body, ‘cause they _didn’t like you_?” Lance stopped to scrub an arm across his face; wiping away the tears that were still falling. Then, with a muttered curse, he yanked off the bulky jacket Keith had somehow never seen him without. It fell unceremoniously to the floor, landing with a heavier thump than Keith would have expected.

 

Of all the responses Keith had been expecting, this was not one of them. He sincerely hoped there was more to it than rage-stripping because, whilst it wasn’t entirely out of the question when Lance was concerned, he knew they would never be able to form Voltron again if Lance was belittling his trauma like that.

 

The scathing and judgemental thoughts vanished when Lance rolled up one of his sleeves to reveal six inches of puckered scar tissue curving up his forearm. Distantly, Keith heard Hunk’s concerned gasp and Pidge’s cuss, but no one made a move to intervene.

 

“Maybe you just couldn’t bear to see yourself as anything but the victim,” Lance spoke with the same bitterness Keith had held only moments prior. Suddenly all the facts were drawing to one final conclusion but Keith couldn’t, _wouldn’t_ , accept it.

 

“You said you wish I’d died that day. The day you gave me these.” Lance pulled up his other sleeve with one final, damning flourish. His arm bore letters, _words_ , carved deep within its flesh with such hatred Keith almost couldn’t believe they were his.

 

“Sometimes I wish I had too.”

 

The whispered confession was like the falling of a guillotine poised to tear apart everything he knew.

 

Lance was his soulmate.

 

_Lance_ was his _soulmate._

 

He couldn’t breathe. Keith _couldn’t breathe_. The Castle was too bright, too large - everything was too loud. He tried to turn away, to run from Lance’s words and accusations but it was too bright and he _couldn’t see_. Everything flickered around him, like the static of the broken TV Keith had used out in the desert. Staticy and confusing and blanketing over all of his senses. His chest _hurt_ and he could hear Shiro speaking in the distance; panicky and upset, but he was too far away to help him. _That’s a shame_ he thought to himself as the static clawed its way into his head, _now who’s going to catch me?_

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


Keith woke up feeling tired. If he remembered grade four English correctly that sentence was an oxymoron, but to be honest he couldn’t give less of a fuck. His head pounded like he’d been chugging vodka shots and it took far too much effort to move his body up into a sitting position. Shiro was at his side immediately, offering a glass of space water - liquid and tasteless like Earthen water but with a slightly thicker consistency. Keith took the spherical mug but made no attempt to drink from it, instead opting to crane his head around the room.

 

He was in the medic room, where Coran patched them up if an injury wasn’t serious enough to require a pod. The team had come to the conclusion that the pods were like X-rays, in that, it was best to use them as little as possible. Pidge and Hunk were talking in fast, hushed voices in the corner; Pidge waving her arms around heatedly whilst Hunk had his hands splayed in a placating gesture. Allura was typing into one of the machines hooked onto the walls, yet Coran and Lance were nowhere to be seen.

 

“Where’s Lance?” Keith blanched at the roughness of his voice. Lance had always said he’d acted like a caveman, but until now he’d never _sounded_ like one.

 

Lance.

 

Lance who was his soulmate. His breath caught in his throat,

 

“Where is Lance?” This time he spoke with more force, the aggression in his tone enough for Allura to stop her typing and Pidge and Hunk to cease their talking, in favour of shamelessly eavesdropping. Shiro seemed to squirm under his stare.

“-At the moment he’s with Coran, but I think we need to leave this conversation for when you’re in a more stable condition. There’s a-”

“I’ve been wanting to have this conversation since I was seven, _where is Lance_?!”

“Keith. This is not a conversation you are in a fit condition to have.”

 

Shiro spoke angrily, in a voice Keith hadn't heard before. It was nothing like the tone he’d used when Keith had broken his window, or gotten into a fight. The way he looked at Keith. He seemed, sickened. As if he’d just witnessed Keith slice up a small animal.

 

“Are you mad at me?” The words weren’t enough to convey what he was feeling but they were all that he could manage. Shiro studied Keith for a few seconds then took a steadying breath.

“Keith. Those scars that Lance has are something else. We need to talk about it when everyone is calm and we can discuss it maturely. I just don’t want him to get hurt again.”

 

Keith felt his stomach drop. It was as if Shiro had punched him.

“Alright. I guess I’ll go back to my room then.” He swung his legs off the bed and made to get up but Shiro stopped him with an arm across the chest.

“Keith, I don’t think you should be alone at the moment. You’re still recovering, I don’t want you getting overworked.” Keith gritted his teeth. _Now_ Shiro cared about him.

“I’m going to my room, Shiro.”

He pushed past the man, ignoring the vertigo that came from standing up and hoping that he didn’t stumble too much as he walked in the direction of his room. As soon as he was out of sight, he leant heavily on the wall, using it as a crutch to make his way down the corridor.

  
  


He sat on his bed, back ramrod straight, for twenty-three minutes before deciding that relaxing was probably a lost cause. Therefore, instead of wasting his time pretending he was going to be able to sleep, he walked down to the training room. By that time the dizziness had all but vanished and whilst he knew it wouldn’t be a great idea to exercise, considering he’d been unconscious less than an hour ago, he needed to do _something_ to get rid of the mess of emotions that were swirling around his gut.

 

For the most part, it worked; it was difficult to concentrate on much else when a gladiator was swinging a sword at your head. However, no matter how hard he trained, he couldn’t rid himself from thoughts of Lance.

 

His soulmate.

 

Lance who was his soulmate.

 

It didn’t make sense. How could they possibly be the same person? How could Lance, who joked and flirted with anything that stood still long enough, whilst simultaneously looking out for the team with the fierce protectiveness of a nesting swan, be his soulmate? The person that had hurt him in ways he hadn’t thought possible. How?

 

His momentary lapse in concentration was enough for the gladiator he’d been fighting to break through his defense and jab the blunted end of its sword into Keith’s arm. Motherfucker.

 

“End training sequence.” The gladiator deactivated and from a third person perspective, so did Keith, collapsing to the floor with a hand cupped around the area the gladiator had struck. Maybe he had overdone it a bit. Shiro would be pissed. He was always adamant that they should take good care of themselves whilst training. It was him that had insisted the gladiator’s weapons should be made non-fatal. Allura had argued with him about it for a long time but he refused to back down until she _eventually_ conceded. To be honest, he didn’t even want them training by themselves. Said it would be easy for someone to hurt themselves and then be unable to get help. Everyone ignored him for that part, but his concern meant they all payed closer attention to what they were doing, as not to overexert themselves.

 

Unless they were Keith.

 

Unless they were Keith and they’d just found out Lance, _Lance_ , was their soulmate.

 

Unless they were Keith and they’d just found out Lance was their soulmate and they were now more aware than ever that the stinging pain of the soon-to-be bruise on his arm was not fading in the slightest.

  
  
  


Keith lay on his back. He waited until his breathing evened out and the initial pain in his arm had faded and then he waited some more. He stared up at the blank, whiteness of the ceiling without properly looking at it. The thoughts flooding his head provided more than enough colour to engulf its blank canvas. He remained in that position for a while, unable to find the strength inside of him to move, until he was disturbed by Shiro’s concerned voice.

“Keith! Are you injured? Are you alright?”

 

For the first time in an unknown amount of hours, Keith moved, heaving himself into a sitting position.

“No. I’m not hurt. I was just. Thinking.” The worry changed into a look of understanding.

“I’ve been looking for you. You said you were going to your room. I guess after all these years I should have known better, huh?” Keith didn’t reply, Shiro was there to tell him something, not make awkward small talk. Shiro knew him well enough to decipher his expression. The man gave a sigh.

“I’ve talked with Lance, right now he’s in the main room, with the others. I know you wanted to speak hours ago but I had to make sure neither of you got hurt again. Neither of you were in the right mind to listen. I wish I could give you more time to be able to think about it, but with our current situation…” The sentence trailed off. Keith waited for him to continue.

“We need to sort this out as quickly as possible. I’m sorry, I know it’s not fair but the universe isn’t fair and right now, the universe is relying on us getting our shit together.”

 

“Yeah. I know.” Keith’s voice was raspy but his resolve was strong. He followed Shiro through the Castle’s winding corridors, trying to ignore how fast and hard his heart was beating.

 

_It’s Lance, it’s just Lance. There’s no need to be scared. Lance isn’t scary. Pull yourself together._

 

Shiro walked through the automatic doors, leaving Keith frozen in the doorway. Lance was seated directly in front of him, body tensed and forcibly passive. Except for his eyes. When they met Keith’s they still burned with the same fierce hatred as before and Keith had been wrong to underestimate him. Keith had been so wrong.

 

Lance was terrifying.

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yay! So, who enjoyed that??


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hehe, here we go again ;)

After Keith collapsed, Shiro carried him to the medical room. It was kind of hot, to be honest. Just lifted him up one-handed, like he didn’t weigh anything. As soon as Keith had started to hyperventilate, he’d sprinted forward like Zargon was at his heels. He’d said to the team afterwards that it was a panic attack. And that, as far as he knew, Keith had never had one before. But there’s a first time for everything, isn’t there?

 

Shiro was so kind. Lance had often liked to imagine that _he_ was Shiro’s soulmate, not Allura. He’d always felt guilty afterwards; Shiro and Allura deserved the happiness they got from one another. Lance had no right to take that from them.

 

Somehow that always left a part of him wondering if that meant _he didn’t deserve happiness._ He tried not to think about it too much.

  
  


They all tried to get Lance to speak; Allura, Pidge, Hunk, even Shiro, once he’d laid Keith down on the Altean med-bed. They asked him about his scars, about his soulmate, about whether he was alright. But Lance didn’t reply because the first thing he’d been asked was, _‘What did you do to Keith?’_

 

Pidge hadn’t meant it. Pidge didn’t mean a lot of things. She was young. She was looking for her family. Lance had to cut her some slack and it was probably his fault anyway for irritating her. Shiro had told him this time and time again and most days he was willing to agree. But not today.

 

Today Lance had been perfectly content to stand in the corner of the room and cry and not speak to anyone ever again. Until Coran stepped forward, with his kind eyes and worried mouth, asking, ‘ _Lance, my boy, would you like to come with me?’_

 

Lance had folded like a wet paper towel and allowed Coran to lead him from both the room and his teammate’s probing questions. As they walked, he tugged his sleeves back down self-consciously. He wished he’d had the foresight to pick his jacket back up. The passageway felt cooler than the main room and whether it was from the temperature or his recent confrontation, Lance found himself shivering.

  
  


He was taken down a corridor in the Castle he hadn’t used before. It wasn’t a particularly noteworthy experience - one corridor didn’t differ much from the next - but he couldn’t help feeling incredibly privileged when Coran ushered him into what had to be the Altean’s own room.

 

It had the same basic layout as Lance’s own, with some personal additions that must have come from Coran himself. Every few seconds, ripples of colour would spiral across the walls, moving fluidly from the floor to the ceiling. It reminded Lance of a kaleidoscope, or a lava lamp, or the small fish tank he and Hunk had unsuccessfully tried raising frogs in. _(Fun fact! Baby leeches look remarkably similar to tadpoles.)_

 

Though, what really struck Lance were the tennis ball sized, white half-spheres that jutted out of the wall like braille. There had to be at least two hundred of them; dotted across the room in no particular pattern. In some areas there were large clumps of them; so close they almost touched, whilst in others there would be single, desolate, lumps. Lance opened his mouth to ask a question but stopped when he felt a cool, gel-like feeling settle across his shoulders.

 

Coran had wrapped him in an Altean blanket - a faintly glowing, green, spongy mass that suctioned itself to Lance like it had been vacuum sealed. The gel heated up his skin and gradually Lance felt his body stop shivering. Coran brought him over to what had to be the bed (luminescent orange and quivering slightly but comfortable nonetheless) and wrapped a reassuring arm around him. Lance meanwhile, did his best not to break down in tears. Again.

 

It was as if all the anger that had previously filled his body had been replaced with a heavy, leaden exhaustion. All he wanted to do was sleep for several long weeks and try to forget everything that had happened. Of course, Lance understood that wasn’t a practical idea; Zarkon didn’t seem the type to allow ‘times out’, but a boy could dream.

 

Coran spoke suddenly, jolting Lance from his thoughts,

“I don’t have a soulmate. We Alteans don’t. _Ahem_ , usually _._ ” He gave a proud smile,

“Allura’s always been special. But Alteans as a species do not have soulmates. I believe the closest thing we’d have to that is the time between the fourteenth and twenty seventh movements, every three Deca-Phoebs, when the strongest of the Alteans coming of age would prove themselves to potential mates by diving into the great rotating peaks of Qesla and retrieving as many Scara stones as they could find.

Now, that was an old tradition - going out of fashion even when _I_ participated - but that didn’t stop me from bringing back more Scara stones than any other Altean there. You should have seen it, Lance, they’re the size of Zikres and a brilliant ruby red. Beautiful. But not nearly as beautiful as..”

 

Lance listened in awe as Coran wove tales of crystal waterfalls and blazing emerald skies. He talked of his travels with King Alfor and the horrible messes the two had put themselves in. He spoke of Altea in its prime with such passion that Lance found himself wishing harder than ever that he had been able to see it. He leant into the Altean’s side and slowly allowed himself to fall asleep, lulled by the images provided by Coran’s soothing voice.

  
  


_Stupid fugly fish. It wasn’t Lance’s fault it had decided to buy those ugly boots. Lance didn’t need them, he already had his own, and they were big and sparkly and better than any dumb boots that fish would ever have. He’d tried to chuck them out, but the fish got mad, yelling and screaming and singing at him. Lance knew that the fish must have been angry, everyone knew that fish were undercooked if they were singing, and fish hate being undercooked. But before he could get to the oven, he felt the ground crumble beneath him and disappear. As he fell, the singing grew louder and louder…_

  
  


Lance sat bolt upright, heart pounding. The singing that had up till that point continued, stopped, bringing him to the conclusion that it was  _not_ a fish singing at him, but Coran, who looked rather worried. His hand hovered above one of the spheres in the wall but he drew it away quickly as he walked over to Lance, concern still coating his features.

“Lance, how are you feeling?”

 

He should have been expecting that one to be honest. Lance did a mental check over. His head ached a bit and he felt slightly dehydrated from the crying but otherwise his  _body_ was doing alright. Mostly. His arm had the all too familiar tingling feeling announcing his soulmate’s pain. Lance ignored it. For the moment he refused to even think about it because he  _wasn’t ready_. He hadn’t been ready the day before, sitting unmoving and alone in his room. He hadn’t been ready in the morning, when he’d been unable to reach his lion - terrified at the prospect of forming Voltron - and he hadn’t been ready  _at all_ when he’d yelled at Keith. Therefore, Lance was currently going with the foolproof plan of ignoring his problems. It was sure to bite him in the ass later but for now he was content to stay in his happy, problem free, bubble of positivity with Coran.

 

“What are those things?” He asked, dodging Coran’s question and pointing at the wall behind the Altean’s head, where there were a large cluster of the spheres. Coran followed the line of his finger and gave a smile once he’d understood what Lance had been referring to. It wasn’t an entirely happy smile. The man’s forehead pinched in a way it didn’t usually and his normally sharp eyes seemed distant.

“Those are an Altean way to preserve memories. Allura doesn’t like them but I find them. Comforting.”

He huffed a soft laugh at Lance’s puzzled face.

“Would you like to try?” Lance nodded, still uncertain of what that meant.

“If that’s alright with you.”

 

Coran motioned for him to follow and strode towards the opposing wall. Once there, he spent several seconds trailing his eyes and fingers across the spheres, deliberating on which one to explain. He finally settled on one nestled in the far right corner, one more worn than the others as if it’d been used frequently.

“This one. Okay Lance, just touch it with your fingers, it only lasts for a few seconds.”

 

Lance obeyed, brushing his fingertips across the wall. For a split second he was blanketed by pitch blackness, then a dazzling world of colour sprung up around him. He was standing in a technicolour green field, embedded with fuchsia flowers. A child lay in his arms. An Altean child. With pink markings and snow white hair. Allura. She giggled, reaching up to pull at his moustache. _Moustache?_

 

Lance was unsettled to find the feeling was like getting a jab after anesthesia - he knew he  _should_ have been in pain, but for some reason it wasn’t properly registering. It was horribly similar to the way his soulmate’s pain would feel before he took it onto his own body. However, before he had a chance to think too deeply about that comparison, the scene dissolved and he found himself back with Coran.

 

“She was a bit of a handful back then.” Coran frowned, muttering, “Now she’s at least three or four handfuls. Just like her father.”

 

Lance still wasn’t entirely sure how he felt about the memory-sphere things but he couldn’t put into words how much it meant to him that Coran trusted him enough to share his past.

“Thank you.” Lance smiled at the older man, “For showing me that.”

“That’s quite all right, number three, I wanted to. I actually have a few involving you, would you like to see them?”

 

Despite his misgivings, Lance didn’t hesitate before answering; Coran was offering to show him a piece of his past and culture, like  _hell_ he was going to turn him down.

“Heck yeah. You know I have a thing for funny, good-looking boys.” He joked to pass off the lump of affection that had settled in his throat. What they had all done to deserve Coran, he’d never know.

  
  


For the next hour or so, the two of them exchanged stories about their families and lives back on their respective planets. It was quiet and private and every now and then, Coran allowed Lance to see another one of his sphere memories. Unfortunately, like all good things, their time together wasn’t long enough and passed far too quickly. Lance felt his little bubble burst at the sound of a knock to the door, followed by Shiro entering the room.

 

“Lance. Coran. I’m really sorry about this, I tried to give you two as much time as I could but we are still in a war situation.” He turned, directing his next words to Lance alone.

“Lance, I really am sorry. You deserve time to heal but we just don't have that option right now. We need to sort out whatever’s going on between you and Keith as soon as possible because we can’t afford to let this impact Voltron. You understand, right?”

 

And Lance did. He understood why Shiro was acting so cold towards the situation. For God’s sake, the guy had had to shake off losing an arm and being held prisoner for a year in order to go fight in an intergalactic war. Lance couldn’t throw that back in his face.

 

But he  _wanted_ to. He wanted so badly to scream and cry and never see Keith again. But that wasn’t an option for him, so he had to suck it up. Heh, now why did that feel so familiar?

  
  


He decided it would be like ripping off a bandaid - he should get it over with quickly rather than prolong the pain. That didn’t stop him from walking after Shiro like he was headed to his execution, dragging his feet behind him with his head hung low.

 

When the automatic doors slid open, the room fell quiet as everyone inside eyeballed Lance. Normally Lance thrived being the center of attention, but the scrutiny from his teammates was not pleasant. Shiro broke the silence with a quick,

“I’ll get Keith. Lance, you can take a seat.” Before hurriedly ducking out the room and leaving Lance stranded.

 

Slowly, Lance moved to sit on an empty sofa facing the door he’d just entered from. Coran passed him to stand by Allura and still no one broke the silence. That was absolutely fine in Lance’s books and he was beyond thankful that neither Pidge nor Hunk attempted to question him. It must have taken a special effort on their part as they were both nosy little shits but Lance was grateful for it. Maybe they’d sensed his unwillingness to talk. He figured he wouldn’t be given the same luxury when Keith arrived so he’d take what he could get.

 

The quietness of the room would usually have bothered him. Lance didn't like silence - perks of living in a large family - but for once he was glad for it. He needed to be able to think. To know what to do. God, he didn't even know how to  _start_. There was just so much he wanted to say, to ask. But he had no idea what he wanted. Maybe an explanation. An apology. A large part of him just wanted to break Keith’s nose and leave it at that. However, as appealing as that sounded, Lance knew that he couldn’t.

 

Shiro would get mad.

 

He just wanted to know  _why_. He couldn’t understand why Keith hated him in the way that he had. Nothing that he’d done back then warranted that kind of rage. It made no sense.

  
  


No matter how much Lance had tried to prepare himself, it was all for naught when Keith walked into the room, following Shiro. He struggled to keep his posture neutral but there was nothing he could do to stop the glare that forced itself through his eyes. He watched in silence as Keith, looking suitably tense, joined Shiro in sitting on the sofa opposite Lance’s own.

 

Now what?

 

There was a long, awkward pause as the room’s occupants struggled to answer that question. Eventually, Shiro spoke up,

“Would-Does one of you want to begin? What happened?”

 

That was surprisingly  _not_ helpful.

 

After another uncomfortably long silence, Lance somewhat got his shit together enough to take the metaphorical microphone.

 

“I took their pain- his pain. All of it. And it was stupid. And unhealthy and irresponsible and I should have stopped but I didn’t. And you know what? I’m sorry about that. ‘Cause that’s not cool.”

 

_That’s great Lancy. You’re calm. You’re collected. You’re articulating your thoughts expertly and with tact. Nothing can stop you now, just don’t let your emotions get the best of you. What’s important right now is Voltron. You don’t need to start a fig-_

 

“But why did you hate me so much? What could I have- I didn’t do  _anything_ to you. I just wanted to help. Why did you leave me alone like that?”

 

_Okay, that’s a little accusatory but still understandable. He’s given you a lot of shit so that little outburst isn’t undeserved, just remember to keep it cool._

 

Keith still didn’t talk and Lance felt his irritation grow. Why was he making it out like  _Lance_ was the bad guy? Sure, Lance was the one who'd been hurt. Who'd been damaged. Who would carry scars reminding him of his soulmate’s hatred of him for the rest of his life. But somehow  _Keith_ was the one flouncing around like some shitty vampire in a teen romance novel.

 

_‘Oh, woe is me. My suffering is immeasurable. I have lived a thousand lives of only pain and turmoil. You, pitiable human, will never understand the horrors I have faced. Begone I say, leave me to my grief. Begone.’_

  
  


“You called me an abuser. You looked me in the face and told me you wished that I had  _died_. What kind of sick- I took  _away_ your  _pain_. That’s not fucking abuse. What the hell’s-”

“You’re the reason I was in pain.” Keith spat,  _finally_ looking at him.

 

_Nice work Mcclain. Handled with dignity and finesse, just like everything else you’ve fucked up in your life, you useless piece of sh-_

 

“You always had a way out of it. Everything that happened, was because of  _you_. You could have left at  _anytime_ but I didn’t _have_ that luxury”

“Yeah, you’re right Keith. I was a truly awful person for not wanting my soulmate to get injured. Is there anything else?”

“Kids heard I had a soulmate that took away all of my injuries and they wanted to  _test it out_. They hurt me, I was bullied for years.”

“So was I,” Lance roared. “You’re not special. Stop acting like the whole world was out to get you.” Keith bristled; apparently that touched a nerve. Pidge and Hunk were watching them like a soap opera. Shiro looked slightly nauseous and unsure of whether to stop them or not.

“A group of them dragged me behind a shop. They sliced up my body ‘cause they thought it was  _fun_. Kids t-”

“Yeah, I still have the scars.”

Keith frowned.

“What?”

 

Lance’s head pounded from the yelling so he spoke in an even tone, sounding oddly detached from what he was saying.

“You did know that your soulmate had to  _feel_ the pain they took? ‘Cause I took everything.” Lance saw Keith open his mouth, to scoff or argue he didn't know but he'd had  _enough_. He peeled off his shirt, dropping it carelessly to the ground.

 

He kept his arms and wrists turned inwards and although he would have liked to believe that Pidge’s open-mouthed stare and Hunk’s soft gasp were due to his manly physique, he wasn’t delusional. The team’s eyes were drawn to the pale scar tissues made obvious on his darker skin tone. They crisscrossed across his torso like tally marks; the longest being just over four inches, whilst others were so faint they almost completely blended into his skin. The tension in the room was thick enough to slice.

 

Slowly, Lance lifted up his wrists. The scars shone bone white as if to mock him. It was scary how many times he’d thought about renovating them. He’d wanted to scratch the words out - peel the mutilated skin away from his arm and hope it grew back clear and unblemished like before.

 

He’d never actually attempted it. He’d been too afraid to try; terrified that the first injury his soulmate took from him would be one he’d inflicted on himself. Of course, now he knew he’d had nothing to worry about. Keith would never have taken an injury from him. The anger from that realisation spurred him on.

 

“You cut into my cephalic vein, Keith. I nearly bled out. The doctor said to my mama that it was unlikely I would live. Did you never wonder where that pain  _went_? About that person, _that kid_ , on the other side? I was  _fourteen_. I was fourteen and my mama thought I wouldn't make it through the night.”

 

His voice trembled as he spoke and on the final word it cracked, giving way to choked sobs and unwelcome tears. Goosebumps rose up across his skin and in the coolness of the room he shivered. He wanted his jacket, someone must have moved it from where he’d dropped it earlier and he seemed exposed without it.

 

Lance felt pathetic. It was humiliating; standing half-naked in front of his team while doing his best not to cry. Keith wasn’t responding, though in fairness, neither was anyone else. It was like one of those pre-exam anxiety dreams, where you’re standing naked in the middle of the hall and everyone’s staring at you.  _Oh wait_.

 

Lance’s face flushed hot. He felt horribly naked and he wanted  _out_. The stares of his team scorched across his skin and yet he still trembled from the cold. He regretted showing the scars. He hated them and everything they stood for. They should have been in the past but now they knew. People he loved and trusted  _knew_. His family. His hero. The blood in his veins ran ice cold and a small sob left his mouth.

 

And then he was  _warm_.

  
  


Hunk.

 

Sweet, kind Hunk who’d draped his stupid, cropped bodywarmer across Lance’s shoulders. He barely had time to sniffle into it before he was wrapped tight in his best friend’s arms. The comforting hold was enough to break the dam in his chest and all of a sudden Lance was  _bawling_.

 

Hunk made gentle shushing noises and half pulled, half carried him to a sofa where Lance curled himself up in the boy’s lap and buried his face into his stomach, arms still wrapped tight around Hunk’s waist. Hunk let him cry it out, keeping up a steady stream of comforting words and noises until gradually his sobs weakened into quiet whimpers.

  
  


Lance was  _tired_. It felt like he’d run an emotional marathon. And then an emotional triathlon. And then played some emotional crazy golf. He could hear the agitated conversations of his teammates but tuned them out by burying his head deeper into the warmth and safety of Hunk. The muffled arguing continued until Shiro’s voice rose above the others and the room fell quiet.

 

Shiro carried on speaking but the words were unintelligible to Lance whose hearing was still obscured by Hunk’s shoulder. He half-heartedly tried to push himself up but Hunk’s tight grip immobilised him. He heard Hunk growl, ‘ _no_.’ in response to Shiro, the sound echoing around his chest and into Lance’s ear.

 

Hunk sounded alarmingly furious in contrast with his usual amenity and if he hadn’t that second been rubbing reassuring circles into Lance’s back, the Lance in question would have been hightailing it out of there. An angry Hunk was a terrifying rarity and  _not_ something you wanted to be opposing.

 

The vibrations of Hunk’s voice went on. ‘ _Shiro, I know you want them to kiss and make up in one easy session but that’s not happening. This isn’t something they can work through in half a varga. They need time._ ’

 

Subtly, Lance lifted his head off of Hunk to listen to Shiro’s response.

“Hunk we don’t  _have_ time. It’s harsh, but this is about the safety of the universe. We ca-”  
“No. This is about the safety of my best friend. And Keith. They’ve both gone through some bad stuff that they did  _not_ deserve and I am not just gonna let that slide. They need time to work this out.”  
“I  _want_ to give them time as well but that’s just not possible. We-”

“Then what’s stopping you?”  
“I can’t, there are lives at stake.”  
“What about _their_ lives?”  
“Hunk, that isn’t fa-”

 

“Stop!”

 

Lance yanked himself free of Hunk’s grasp and turned towards Shiro, who looked entertainingly uncomfortable. Keith stood behind him, face covered by his ridiculously long bangs. Lance didn’t allow his eyes to linger on him for more than a second, forcing himself to focus on Shiro.

“It’s fine, I don’t need time. I can deal.”

 

“Uh, Pidge?” Lance almost felt embarrassed by the timidity of his voice. Pidge jumped at the sound of her name, turning to him stiffly.

“What?” _Eloquent as usual._

“Do you still have that restrictor?”  
She nodded,

“Yeah, but only the material.”

“Would you be able to create a new one?”  
“Yes.” Pidge’s answer was immediate, calculations coming to her as naturally as breathing. The implications behind his question took longer to compute.

“But why would you want one? You already know Keith is your soulmate.”

 

Lance shook his head slowly, refusing to make eye contact with Keith, who’d finally lifted his head up to look at him.

 

“I don’t have a soulmate.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sup
> 
> Honestly this would have gone up sooner but I watched all five Sharknado films back to back and I had to stop and reevaluate my life a little


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter watch me say ‘Fuck you all, I can change pov whenever I damn want to!’

_“I don’t have a soulmate”_

 

Hunk had never heard Lance sound so vicious. It just wasn’t like him. Lance was fun and easy going and didn’t like to gossip ‘cause, _‘My mama always said, those that gossip to you will gossip about you.’_ Sure, Lance got frustrated. Lance got irritated. Lance was ridiculously petty at times but he wasn’t cruel. Something was very wrong with his best friend.

 

His point made, Lance appeared to walk calmly from the room but Hunk saw the way his hands clenched, along with the unmistakable trembling of his shoulders. Without stopping to explain, he rushed after him into the corridor. He was immediately glad he had, for as soon as Lance felt he was out of sight he’d crumpled against the wall, Hunk barely managing to catch him in time.

 

Lance curled into him obediently, moving his hands to grip at the front of Hunk’s shirt. He was crying again. Huge shuddering gasps that rattled through his body like he was being torn apart from the inside. Hunk had seen a lot of Lance’s tears; the shining crocodile ones that glimmered across his eyelashes for dramatic effect, or the frustrated sobs that would come after his latest breakup. More recently he’d had to experience the soft, almost silent, whimpers of Lance’s homesickness. This was just another time that Lance needed comforting. Hunk could handle that.

 

He gently picked Lance up, princess style. The boy tucked his head into the crook of Hunk’s neck, dampening his shirt and sending puffs of air down his back. Hunk’s jacket, which had remained loosely draped across his shoulders throughout everything that had happened, fell open; exposing once again the damaged skin on his chest. Making a quick decision, he shifted Lance’s weight onto one arm, using the other to pull the jacket closed around his body. Lance deserved some modesty.

 

Hunk carried Lance towards his room. He’d considered going to Lance’s own, so he’d be in a familiar environment, but he was worried they’d come across Keith who slept in the adjacent room. Right now he wanted Lance as far away from Keith as possible and he was reluctant to do anything that might bring them together. Therefore with Lance’s room no longer being a viable option, he’d chosen to take the paladin to the next best place he could think of - his own room.

 

Once he’d stepped inside, the automatic door sliding shut behind him, he made to deposit Lance on his bed. Lance refused to let go of him; still crying and clinging to Hunk like an oversized koala.

“Okay, okay, I won’t leave you.”

 

With an impressive display of strength (in his opinion), Hunk maneuvered the two of them onto his bed, so that he was leaning back against the headboard and Lance was seated in his lap, drooped across him like the world’s saddest blanket.

 

Minutes passed and Lance’s crying slowly dwindled into slow shuddering breaths. Hunk stroked his back, at a loss for what else to do. How had he not known about such a large portion of his best friends life? It should have been obvious. Lance had never liked talking about soulmates, that was true, but there was more than that. Things that hadn’t made sense.

 

Back in the Garrison, Lance had been his roommate. Hunk had found out pretty quickly that although he was friendly enough, he had no idea how to hold a conversation. Lance switched haphazardly between completely dominating a dialogue and not speaking a word. He had trouble with prolonged eye contact and any talking that went on for more than five minutes had him twitching with nervous energy, as if he was desperate to rush out of there.

 

Hunk would have assumed he was just shy if it wasn’t for the excitement with which Lance spoke to people. He seemed to genuinely enjoy chatting, despite knowing none of the social cues you would expect him to be aware of. Eventually, Hunk had decided that that was just how Lance acted.

 

During the following two years at the Garrison, Lance refined his social skills, becoming more confident in himself and others; Hunk hadn’t missed the boy’s slight aversion to touch during his first few months. Hunk had cunningly helped him move past that, with meticulously planned high fives, fist bumps and eventually, hugs.

 

They didn’t talk about their soulmates.

 

Not once for two years.

 

Well, that wasn’t entirely true. During the third or fourth month of their first year, Hunk had given himself a nasty paper cut across his thumbnail. Lance had shot him a sympathetic look, which was then replaced with curiosity when the wound appeared to heal itself.

 

_“My soulmate.”_ Hunk had said, by means of explanation. At that, an indecipherable emotion had crossed Lance’s face. Hunk had panicked, afraid to lose his new friend, and proceeded to word vomit every thought, feeling and consideration he’d ever had about his soulmate. Afterwards, he’d asked about Lance’s own, hoping to give the chatty boy an opening. Lance opened his mouth to answer when his attention suddenly shifted to a focal point over Hunk’s head. From there he’d quickly switched topics, refusing to do anything but gush over the attractiveness of a dark-haired boy he’d seen whilst simultaneously avoiding answering Hunk’s question.

 

After that, for some reason, the topic of soulmates was never brought up again. It hadn’t felt weird at the time. Hunk had spoken to other students at the Garrison about soulmates. It just happened that Lance had never been one of them.

 

Lance shifted in his lap, twisting into a more upright position. His head lay on Hunk’s chest; eyes closed as he chewed on his bottom lip.

“Hunk, you’re my best friend. You know that, right?”

Hunk nodded, not wanting to stop Lance from speaking. Lance opened his eyes and gave a wry smile that appeared lost on his tearstained face.

“Well, you were also my first friend.”

Hunk pulled his arms tighter around the boy.

 

“I moved to America when I was seven. Barely knew any English. I was foreign and different and the other kids never liked me to start with. Then they found out my soulmate had never taken my pain and that was that. I just wanted to help them, Hunk. I thought if I could stop them from hurting the same way I was hurting…”

 

Lance sniffed loudly, making Hunk flinch at the noise so close to his ear. The movement startled Lance and he pulled himself off of Hunk to sit further away on the bed, wrapping his bare arms defensively around his legs. Hunk missed his heat at once.

 

“It was selfish maybe. Helping them ‘cause I couldn’t help myself. But, you know what? I was just a kid. I didn’t know any better but at least I wanted to help.” He stopped, then let out an angry yell,

“What we experienced wasn’t even on the same level. It’s not fair. He doesn’t get to feel the same anger as me. He’s not allowed to hurt. What-”

 

A rhythmic beeping interrupted Lance’s spiel. It was quite different to the Castle’s alarm but it was one they recognised just as easily. Pidge’s. There must have been an alert down at the bridge. Hunk looked over at Lance who’d closed his eyes again; jaw clenched and one hand clapped across his mouth, as if he had to physically stop the words from pouring out. Before Hunk could say anything, Lance stood up.

“I’ll do this for Pidge only. I don’t want to look at him. I don’t want to talk to him.”

 

Hunk nodded his agreement. If Keith came within a three foot radius of Lance, Hunk would kill him.

 

______________________________________________________________________________

 

_“I don’t have a soulmate.”_

 

Keith counted two hundred and fifty eight ticks of horrified silence before a quiet, high pitched buzzing noise interrupted it. It was coming from a small device in Pidge’s pocket. Unable to hide the look of relief on her face she’d rushed towards the bridge, rambling about a Galran message she'd intercepted.

 

Unlike the Castle’s main alarm which activated when receiving distress calls, this smaller alarm had been manufactured by Pidge to trigger when it found messages that contained certain codewords; Earth, humans, prisoners, etcetera. It was just one of the ways she was searching for her family and although it had been unsuccessful in that respect, team Voltron had rescued a lot of prisoners using the information she’d picked up.

 

After Pidge’s abrupt departure, Shiro stepped forward, a look of pity already pasted on his face. Keith bolted, following Pidge. He wasn’t ready to talk.

 

Pidge looked both surprised and uncomfortable when she turned to see Keith enter the bridge. She had her space laptop perched on her knees and the hologram screen at her station switched on. Both displayed lines of violet symbols that meant nothing to Keith.

 

“Uh, so have you found anything?”

To her credit, Pidge nodded and went straight back to scrolling down the holoscreen, glasses glinting as she absorbed the information.

 

“I’ve picked up a message sent from a Galran ship talking about _‘a rare type of prisoner.’_ It’s a large battlecruiser with a powerful firewall so I can’t hack into its network without access to its main database which would be located onboard. I can track the ship’s location from the position it was in when the message was sent, but I don’t have any evidence that my family’s on board. I don’t want to get my hopes up, but if there’s even a chance...” She trailed off, fingers pausing on the keyboard.

 

Keith recognised the hopeful, hopelessness to her voice. It held the same desperation that he’d felt months ago, when he’d spent hours upon hours searching for any information he could find about Shiro's whereabouts. He would have done anything to find him and Pidge was now in that same position.

 

He watched her work in silence for several minutes, his enjoyment of the unexpected peace spoiled by the fear that Shiro was going to come bursting through the door at any second.

 

Pidge’s laptop gave a muted buzz and Keith saw an intricate blueprint appear on the screen. Pidge made a clicking noise with her tongue.

 

“Okay, by running the identification code listed on the message through the Castle’s database, I’ve found the ship’s model. Now I’ll be able to plan the easiest access route to both the computer mainframe and the prison cells.”

“Why do you need to go to the computer mainframe?”

Pidge gave him a look she usually reserved for Lance,

“It’s a  _battlecruiser_. If I can access the ship’s files I can see any orders issued to them from the Galra. It'd put us two steps ahead of them!”

 

She resumed her typing with a passion. Keith understood very little of what she was doing but the bright red arrow scoring a path through the blueprint of the ship was simple enough for even him to understand. Writing the route took less than fifteen doboshes from start to finish and upon completion Pidge lept from her chair, performed two horribly out of tune verses of _‘Simply the best’_ and high fived herself. She faced him with shining eyes.

“We’re in!”

 

Next, Pidge pulled the small device from before back out of her pocket and pressed a few of the buttons.

“This’ll alert the others.”

An amplified version of the tinny alarm he’d heard earlier rumbled around the room and both Pidge and Keith clapped their hands to their heads.

 

Even above the din, Keith could hear Pidge’s cursing as she fiddled with the gadget in her hands. Keith was tempted just to smash the thing but after a couple of ticks, Pidge found the right combination to shut it off.

 

“Shit, sorry, the alarm wasn’t hooked up to the Castle. The sound should have been distributed around the ship.”

 

Keith nodded, using the movement as an excuse to try and shake off the ringing in his ears.

“So, did the others hear it?”

Pidge snorted,

“I think Zarkon could have heard it.”

 

She was proven right at the appearances of Shiro, Allura, Coran, Hunk, and _Lance_.

 

Whilst Pidge explained her findings to the team, Keith did his utmost to ignore the blue paladin. Luckily for him, Lance was standing at the opposite end of the room, shadowed by Hunk. Keith wasn’t ready for this.

 

He tried to concentrate on the end of Pidge’s TED Talk.

“..I need one group to find the ship’s prisons and another to cover me whilst I hack into the ship’s computer. The ship is a high level battlecruiser so we’ll only be able to use the green lion as any of the others will show up on the ship’s sensors. Is that alright Shiro?”

 

Shiro looked torn.

“Do we really need the _whole_ team?”

Keith had know Shiro for God knows how many years but it was an unchangeable fact that the guy didn’t have a subtle bone in his body.

Pidge’s face twitched with guilt.

“I’m sorry, I have to use two groups for this, and you’ve always said that it’s not safe to have groups of less than two.”

 

Shiro didn’t look happy about it, but he agreed.

“Okay Pidge, Hunk and Lance will be your guard whilst me and Keith will search for the prisons. Everyone suit up - the longer we wait, the further away the ship moves from the coordinates Pidge found.”

 

It was cramped in the green lion. And it smelled faintly of moss. Keith found himself separated from Lance by both Hunk and Shiro and he was one hundred percent sure that it was no coincidence.

 

Luckily for Pidge, the cruiser was still in almost exactly the same place she’d tracked the message back to. The cloaked lion made its way undetected to the docking platform Pidge had decided on.

 

Once they were inside, they excited the lion and were detected almost immediately.

 

Within moments of stepping off the green lion’s ramp, they’d been swarmed by Galran droids. At once Keith summoned his bayard to his hand, slashing a path through the robots. Pidge was yelling through their headsets, effectively distracting all of them at once.

“We can’t stay and fight. If they send out an alert the Galra will lock down the ship. We need to get out of here quickly.”

 

Keith watched as Pidge ran down the corridor in front of them followed by Shiro and then Hunk. He made to pursue them when Pidge’s voice rang into his ear again.

“Fucking shit. I’ve just got the ship’s plans up again. Lance, Keith, I need you two to take the corridor on your right. I thought the turning was further along but we don’t have time to go back. We’re nearly at the main computer and as soon as I’m there I can unlock all of the doors. Got it?”

 

“Yeah.”

“Copy that.”

 

Keith deactivated one final robot before turning and following Lance who’d got a good head start on him.

 

Shit. They weren’t supposed to be together - to be  _relying_ on each other. He didn’t know if he could do this.

 

______________________________________________________________________________

 

Lance knew he couldn’t do this.

 

He half jogged-half ran down the Galran corridor, bayard out and prepared to fight. Luckily that wasn’t necessary and he was only stopped when he reached a looming set of unmistakably  _closed_ doors. The sound of graceless footsteps behind him alerted him to Keith’s presence. _Fabulous_.

“Hey Pidge, what’s the situation on those doors?”

“Are they open?”

Lance looked again at the thick steel in front of him,

“..No.”

“Then shut up and let me concentrate.”

Pidge needed to get more sleep. She was cranky. And _mean_. Lance called her a number of names in his head as he waited for the metal to shift.

 

“Okay, doors will be opening any second now. Be careful, we don’t know how many guards there’ll be in there. And _hurry_. They already know we’re on board, it’s only a matter of time before they track us down. Don’t get yourselves backed into a corner.”

“Pidge, _lighten up_.”

“Lance I swear to-”  
“Doors are open, gotta go!”

 

The doors opened onto a small metal balcony with a flight of stairs on the far left leading down to a level below. The _extremely_ well guarded level. _Fuck_. Lance flung himself down flat against the balcony the exact moment Keith yelled, _“Cover me!”_ and jumped over the railing.

 

Damn it, that was such a _Keith_ thing to do. Almost instantly the red paladin was swarmed by the _definitely-way-more-than-they’d-expected_ Galran soldiers. Lance swore, aimed his bayard, and began picking off as many of the fighters as he could. It was an awful spot to try and shoot from - all of the action was happening directly below him so in order to aim, he had to stick his head out of the railing and into the danger zone.

 

Keith wasn’t making it much easier. He was moving around so much it was nearly impossible for Lance to shoot without accidentally hitting him. Disregarding his own thoughts on the matter, the team would be pissed if he ended up shooting Keith.

 

Lance lined up another shot but a sudden wave of dizziness sent it wide. His head was buzzing and he felt an unexpected surge of tiredness. That couldn’t be good. He tried to find Keith through the throng of Galra but he couldn’t see him. Thankfully, one of the soldiers gave him a helping hand and hoisted the clearly unconscious red paladin above the crowd and onto his shoulders.

 

The Galran was heading towards the exit and Lance was not about to let that happen. He began shooting again, struggling to stop the soldier from leaving with Keith. He managed to bring down a few more of the guards but with the Keith no longer drawing attention away from him, Lance’s position was exposed. Shots teased past him as he launched himself away from the balcony edge.

 

He was a sitting duck.

 

A laser ripped through his arm just as the door behind him opened. He was dragged up by his injured arm, the Galran in question twice his height and three times his size. He struggled against the grip violently; twisting and bucking his body around, the rush of adrenaline barely enough to cover the agony in his arm. The Galran snarled, bringing his other hand down with a considerable amount of force on Lance’s wrist. A sickening _snap_ echoed through the room.

 

Lance opened his mouth in an empty scream. _His wrist burned_. He chanced a look at it and gagged; his hand was disconnected from the rest of his arm, dangling uselessly, a piece of bone protruding from his mangled skin. He tried to jerk away again but froze at the sound of a blaster heating up, metal pressing against the glass of his helmet. The Galran lifted his visor, yellow eyes cold and indifferent.

“We would receive more approbation for two living paladins but Zarkon would be content with one. Come quietly.”

 

Lance firmly believed that his face was too pretty to be splattered against the Galran spaceship’s floor so he stood. The corridor wavered around him and he fought back the urge to vomit. Right, he’d been shot. Duh.

 

Slightly above the Galran’s secure hold on his arm, Lance could see the frayed material of his spacesuit surrounding the wound. It looked revolting. The concentrated heat of the laser had half cauterised the injury but there was still too much blood leaving Lance’s arm for him to be okay with it. Still, it wasn’t as bad as it could have been. At the very least he’d escaped immediate death because the wound was in his arm rather than a major organ. That would have been _really_ bad.

 

Lance sighed - God, you knew your life was going downhill when you counted getting shot in the arm as a win.

 

The Galran shoved him through several long corridors. At, first Lance had tried to remember their route, in case he had a chance to escape, but the nauseating throbbing of his wrist coupled with the ship’s labyrinth like structure soon burned that idea out. Every step forward aggravated his arm and the smell of charred flesh was beginning to make its way through the air filters in Lance’s helmet. Firstly, why did roasted pork smell so much better than roasted Lance and secondly - _Fuck,_ **_his helmet_**.

 

God; Pidge, Iverson, his mama, Hetty from second grade and the entirety of the Garrison drama club were right. Lance was an _idiot_.

 

He casually rubbed his helmet against his shoulder, switching on the comns in the process. His escort seemed to take no notice of the action. Lance could barely breathe. He and Pidge were going to be having some _serious_ conversations about voice activated comns in the near future.

 

Lance had never been more relieved to hear Pidge’s voice in his life. He whispered softly into the microphone in his helmet, trying not to draw the guard’s attention.

“ _Hey. Pidge. We’ve hit a slight snag._ ”

 

Pidge’s breathing sounded laboured and Lance could hear loud noises in the background.

“Lance? Where are you? What do you mean?”

Lance winced at her volume, desperately praying that it only sounded so loud because it was being played directly into his ears.

“ _Uh, well, Keith’s unconscious and we’ve both been captured._ ”

 

“WHAT?!”

The Galran placed his hand on a sensor which opened a panel of wall on their right. Lance was pushed through the doorway and into a long, narrow room, lined on both sides with what had to be cells.

“ _Also, your map was completely wrong and we were nowhere near the cells. So, really this is all your fault._ ”  
“Lance this is not the time! Where are you?”

 

Lance didn’t answer, they had stopped outside one of the cells. Peering through the murky violet shield Lance could vaguely make out a figure. The Galran pressed a button on the wall besides the cell making the purple screen drop. They then shoved Lance forward, causing him to stumble into the small room as the screen reappeared up behind him.

 

Lance fell to the floor, shrieking when his weight fell on his injured wrist. The pain that tore through his body was enough to make him retch. He clenched his eyes shut as his vision almost whited out - willing himself to stay conscious. He listened as his Galran guard’s footsteps grew fainter.

 

Someone gently moved him onto his back but it took a good number of minutes before Lance felt optimistic enough to crack open his eyes. Blinking coloured spots out of his vision, he focused in on the worried face of Keith Kogane.

 

“Lance what happened? Are you hurt? Where are the others?”

Keith asked more questions but Lance had stopped listening. Most of his attention was fixed on an ongoing mental repetition of, _‘don’t puke don’t puke don’t puke don’t puke don’t puke don’t puke.’’_

 

“Shit, your arm.”  
“I know.” Lance gritted out. “Can you speak to Pidge?” He clutched a hand around the still bleeding laser wound. He preferred the blood _inside_ his body, thank you very much.

Keith shook his head, frowning,

“There’s something blocking the signal inside these cells, I can’t get through to anyone.”

 

Lance tried anyway. Keith was right.

 

Goddam it - he needed something to bind his arm. His hand couldn’t put enough pressure on it to stop the bleeding. He took quick, short breaths, his heart hammering in his chest. Despite his temperature regulated space suit, he felt freezing. He shivered violently.

 

“Keith, you’re supposed to put pressure on bullet wounds, right? Is that the same for laser wounds? Should I be doing anything else?”

 

His head was pounding and he didn’t dare look down at the injury again. He breathed heavily through his nose, desperate to get enough oxygen to his brain. Keith didn’t respond, eyes wide and stuck on Lance’s wrist.

 

“Keith, help me out here.”

 

Lance blinked furiously to dispel the grey spots that were covering his vision.

 

“Keith, I need- I need. Keith.”

 

White noise filled his body, Keith was saying something frantically.

 

“Keith.. _Keith_.”

 

______________________________________________________________________________

 

Lance fell limp and Keith’s heart _stopped_.

 

He hurled himself towards the fallen blue paladin, pressing down on the still-bleeding wound with trembling hands. Lance gave a soft moan and made a feeble attempt to move away from the touch. Keith sighed in relief; Lance wasn’t dead. Yet.

 

He didn’t know what to do. There was nothing he _could_ do.

 

**_No._ **

 

There _was_ something.

 

Keith’s breathing stuttered in his chest. This wasn’t about his soulmate. This was about _Lance_. It was different. He _had_ to do this.

 

Yet he was frozen.

 

Staring at the dying form of his teammate, Keith’s body felt like lead. He couldn’t do it.

 

Lance was going to die because of him.

 

No. _No_. That _wasn’t_ going to happen. Keith screwed his eyes shut, trying to flood his head with thoughts of Lance. The more he focussed on the boy, the stronger he felt a pull of connection. It was like he was swimming against the current in a pitch black ocean, desperately pushing himself towards a light. He kept going; kept reaching, when a sudden burst of sound made him jerk away. Just like that, the fragile tether he’d created between him and Lance snapped.

 

Keith turned towards the noise. The violet energy shield was no more and standing in its place was Pidge, Hunk and Shiro, Pidge sporting a smug look.

“I traced your location from your helmets- _Oh shit_.”

 

Hot tears burned down Keith’s cheeks,

“Help him.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> keith's very confused rn
> 
> and lance is actually dead rip


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sup, missed me?

Keith left the pods before Lance did. Truthfully, he hadn’t even wanted to go in but Coran had insisted. Apparently the blow to the head he’d received from the Galran soldier had swollen and the Altean was worried he might have gained a concussion.

 

Within seconds of unsteadily stepping away from the pod, Hunk had hustled him out of the room, refusing to speak to him. Keith had only managed to catch a brief glimpse of the blue paladin before the doors to the pod room had rushed closed. He hadn’t liked what he’d seen. It was unnatural to see Lance so still; the boy had to be part hummingbird with the way he was always moving and fluttering around.

 

After forcing him out of the room, Hunk wouldn’t allow him within six feet of the pod. He spoke to Keith curtly, the usual undertone of warmth in his voice missing. Keith couldn’t help loathing himself for that - what kind of scum did you have to be for Hunk to hate you?

 

Keith spent the next forty-seven doboshes pacing outside the entrance to the pod room; hating himself, hating Lance, hating their situation. Eventually Pidge took pity on him and dragged him into a room on the ship he’d never seen before. He figured he must have looked pretty pathetic for her to have stepped in.

 

The room was low ceilinged and dark, crammed with wires of varying thickness and humming machinery that stretched high up the walls. Everything ticked or buzzed or whirred and the whole room was so _Pidge_ that Keith half wondered how she could ever bring herself to leave the place. Unfortunately, he didn’t have a chance to analyse the room any further before Pidge pointed him towards what looked like a mustard yellow beanbag and said bluntly,

“You can sit there.”

 

It didn’t sound like a suggestion.

 

Keith sat down heavily on the pseudo beanbag, grimacing as he severely underestimated how dense it was going to be. Pidge joined him soon afterward, perching on the edge of a second beanbag with a lot more grace than Keith had used. Her laptop was pulled back onto her knees as her fingers danced across the keyboard with a speed Keith could never hope to mimic.

 

He waited as patiently as he could for her to say something. _Anything_. But her eyes remained focused on the screen and she showed no signs of slowing or stopping. Keith was impatient on the best of days, so it wasn’t long before he broke the peace of the room with an irritable huff,

“Aren’t you going to say something?”

 

Pidge stopped typing to look at him.

“No.”

She made as if to start again but Keith stopped her.

“Why not? Why did you bring me in here?”

She considered the question for just long enough for Keith to know she was only drawing it out to piss him off.

“No particular reason. You needed to get away from it.”  
“From what?”

She rolled her eyes,

“From whatever’s going on between you and Lance. Just chill out for a bit, neither of you are dealing with this right and at the moment you’re just making this worse.

 

“I’m n-”

“No.”

“That’s s-”

“Uh-uh.”

  
“You ca-”

  
“Stop.”

  
“PIDGE!”

She smirked at him, probably delighting in his suffering, that little cockroach.

“Stop thinking about it and go to sleep. I’m still working on this code, I’ll wake you up if anything happens, kay?”

 

Keith could have complained, could have stormed out the room and continued with his pacing; but Pidge was right. And she was trying to help him. And Keith hadn’t slept in _hours_. So he leaned into the ungiving surface of his would-be-beanbag and obediently closed his eyes.

  
  
  


_Thunk_.

 

Keith yanked his knife from his belt and pushed himself off the beanbag, bright flashes of light popping across his vision as a result of waking up too fast.

“Fuck! What the fuck? Keith!! What the hell?”

 

Pidge.

 

Pidge was pinned underneath him; glasses askew and fury burning in her gaze. Right, he’d fallen asleep in Pidge’s Batcave.

 

“Sorry.”

 

Keith moved off of her as quickly as he could, timing it just right so as to avoid the leg she’d kicked up, aimed at his stomach. That kid had a _temper_. Keith sat back down carefully on the beanbag he’d apparently managed to fall asleep on, and scrubbed a hand down his face.

 

He hadn’t dreamed, or maybe he had, but he didn’t remember. Keith rarely remembered his dreams. It didn’t particularly bother him, it wasn’t as if they mattered.

 

Pidge was still swearing at him; using insults Keith hadn’t even _heard_ of. Shiro would not be happy.

“Jesus, I just wanted to tell you Lance was awake, you didn’t have to go all _V For Vendetta_ on me! Quiznacking _fuck_.”

 

She broke off, seeming to take notice of the sudden tension in Keith’s body. Then, in a worrying display of emotion, her expression softened,

“You’ve got to talk to him sooner or later. It sucks but Shiro’s right, it’s not just about you, it’s about the rest of the universe.”  
  
Keith felt a great surge of bitterness inside his chest. Why was it _his_ responsibility to look after the rest of the universe? Couldn’t it handle itself for a bit? He wasn’t even sure if it was selfish of him to think that. What was he even allowed to feel?

“Keith-”  
“Fine. I’ll talk to him.”

 

Pidge looked taken aback at how quickly he’d backed down. He couldn’t exactly blame her - He’d once refused to speak to Shiro for three days over an argument about the pronunciation of ‘ _Peanut.'_

“Right. Good. That’s good.”  
She maintained approximately three seconds of eye contact before diving for her laptop, hiding her face behind the screen. In a different situation, Keith would probably have smiled. Instead he walked out of the room, taking a longer route than necessary to the pods.

  


The doors to the room slid open silently and for a little while Keith just watched as Lance and Hunk spoke in low voices, sitting on the room’s steps. He couldn’t hear what they were saying from across the room but Hunk looked concerned. Lance’s face was hidden from where Keith was standing but his body sat hunched over, defensively. They were sitting closer together than what was probably necessary for the conversation and Keith felt a momentary surge of jealousy towards their casual intimacy. He quickly waved the feeling aside. He needed to speak to Lance and it would be better if he didn’t drag it out.

 

“Lance. We need to talk.”

 

_Damn that sounded lame._

 

Lance flinched at the sound of his voice whilst Hunk moved in front of his friend instinctually, like he thought the boy needed _protecting_ from Keith. The red paladin felt a stab of pain in his chest at the realisation.

 

As the silence stretched out, Keith’s uncertainty about his rather blunt approach grew.  He should have waited longer; Lance had just gotten out of a healing pod after all. God he was stupid, why hadn’t he-

 

“Alright.”

Keith’s head snapped up to look at Lance who wore a steely look of determination on his face. Hunk made a noise as if to protest, but Lance placed a hand on his shoulder and whispered something into the yellow paladin’s ear. Keith couldn’t hear what was said but Hunk slumped slightly, face resigned.

“Be careful.”

 

His quiet warning hurt. Did Hunk no longer trust him?

 

Keith tried to push that thought aside as he led Lance towards the training room. Tried not to think about whether he’d destroyed his friendship with the friendly paladin forever.

  


Once they’d reached the training room door, Keith checked to see if Lance was still behind him. He was. Still, he hesitated to open the door and Lance raised a questioning eyebrow. The look was so familiar and stupid that for a split second Keith could almost pretend that nothing had happened. Then Lance caught his eye and his face returned to a tight, forced passiveness.

 

Keith’s chest ached.

  


“Neutral ground.” He finally explained, answering Lance’s unvoiced question.

“We can’t use either of our rooms, obviously. The main room is used constantly and any other room in the castle could have someone walking through at any time, but I’m the only person who uses the training room at this time so we’ll be fine here.”

 

Keith resisted the urge to cringe after saying all of that. He could have at least _tried_ to pretend he hadn’t put so much thought into it. Why the hell would Lance agree to something like that?

“Fine.”

Right. He forgot. Lance was an idiot. Proceed.

 

Lance followed Keith into the room with no further questions, sitting opposite him in the rooms far corner. Perhaps it was Keith’s paranoia talking, but he couldn’t help notice Lance had sat right next to the weapons stand. He was momentarily thankful that his dagger was still attached to his hip. Just in case.

  


Keith had only just begun to organise his thoughts when, to his surprise, Lance spoke, voice firm with intent.

“I get why you’re mad.”

 

Okay, Keith hadn’t been expecting that.

 

“You’ve had a really shitty time and that must have sucked for you. But that wasn’t my fault.”  
“How-”  
“No, not this time.” Lance snapped at him.

“I was not the one who hurt you. Maybe they hurt you _because_ of me but that wasn’t my fault and you need to understand that and stop _blaming_ me for it because I. Never. Hurt. You.

You need to stop punishing me for things other people did to you. I was just trying to protect you.”  
  
“I never asked you to!”  
Keith exploded, words bursting from his mouth,

“I never asked you to do any of that.  _You_ chose to do so and that’s all on _you_ so don’t you dare try to put the blame on me. I know I hurt you, but I’m not going to apologise because _you_ make bad choices and destroyed yourself over a stranger!”

 

Lance audibly closed his mouth, teeth clicking shut in the now silent room. Then, to Keith’s horror, his eyes welled with tears, dripping down his face at an alarming volume. Lance reacted before he a chance to, wiping the moisture from his face with a snarl,

 

“You still tried to kill me.”

Keith’s heart clenched  
“You can twist my actions however you want but at the end of the day, I took your pain because I had no one else and for the same reasons you tried to kill me. I made a mistake. You committed a crime.”

  
  
  


Keith remembered that night. Strung high on a cocktail of adrenaline and anger he’d never been sure of how deep he’d cut. Yet, in the weeks following the incident, the silence from his soulmate made a cold dread settle in his stomach. A fear that he’d gone too far.

Then one day, like nothing had ever happened, he’d woken up to blemish free skin and, just like his injuries, his remorse and regret had vanished.

  
  
  


“I’m sorry.”  
It sounded crude; Keith had never had a way with words. Yet these ones especially, the ones he so desperately needed to get across to Lance seemed to stick in his throat. How are you even supposed to apologise for something like that?

 

Lance was shaking his head, eyes flicking across Keith’s face in disbelief.

“I can’t. I ca- I’m sorry. I can’t.”

 

He stood in a rush, tripping over himself in an effort to distance himself from Keith. The red paladin made no attempt to stop him, watching as he left the training room.

 

He brushed aside the sudden pang of loss. _Whatever_. He was in the training room anyway.

  
“Begin training level five.”

  
  
  


Shiro found him hours later. Huddled in the room’s corner, hair clenched between his fists as a fresh wave of tears made its way down his face.

  
  
  


For weeks that was it. They didn’t speak unless it concerned a mission and within the Castle Lance barely acknowledged him. He’d never thought he’d notice Lance’s absence so much. The boy had always pushed him into action - further than he thought he could go, riling him up with his stupid one-sided rivalry. Losing that had torn away a chunk of his life he’d never thought he’d miss.

 

Not to mention the damage done to his relationships with the rest of the paladins.

 

The first couple of days following the incident, Hunk had refused to stay in the same room as him. It was only after a stern conversation from Shiro that Hunk reluctantly began speaking to him again. It wasn’t anything like it’d been before, Hunk treated him politely and nothing more.

 

_Politely._

 

_Hunk._

 

It was like getting a handshake from your mum.

 

Shiro too had drawn away from him, though Keith often caught him staring at both him and Lance with a look of guilt. He had yet to confront the man about it. He didn’t know what he would do if he lost Shiro.

 

Coran remained frosty with him - it was no secret that Lance was his favourite - whilst Allura clearly had better things to worry about than her paladin’s sordid past. His only comfort came from Pidge who, for the most part, didn’t change. She outright refused to speak to him again about Lance or anything regarding soulmates, but she didn’t treat him any differently which Keith counted as a small mercy.

 

Perhaps the only thing stopping him from taking out his frustration on the blue paladin was the fact that Lance had been subjected to the same caution. The others treated him like he was made of glass and even Hunk was acting distant towards his friend. Their pain was still raw and they definitely hadn’t dealt with it in the way they should have.

 

They’d needed to form Voltron four times since Lance and Keith’s conversation and each time Keith had loathed the frail, timid connection that linked him to the others. The inferno of energy they’d come to expect had been reduced a mere trickle of power. It was like trading a helicopter for a paper aeroplane.

 

The trust in one another that they’d worked so hard to build had been shattered, leaving them struggling the same way they had during their first weeks in space.

  


On the other hand, since he’d first opened himself up to the bond connecting him and Lance, he’d only become more aware of the buzzing sensation that announced Lance’s pain. He didn’t know if Lance had stopped asking for a restrictor or if Pidge had simply refused to make one as she refused to answer any of his questions on the subject. So the bond remained.

 

Once or twice, in the dead of night, he’d toyed with the idea of taking some of Lance’s burden. Would that bring them a step forward in healing? Or would Lance see that as a spit in the face? The possibilities terrified him. What if he pushed Lance away forever?

 

Keith might have never made a move, trapped in a sea of _what ifs_ , if Pidge hadn’t fallen ill.

  
  


______________________________________________________________________________

  
  
  


Lance was the one who found her.

 

She hadn’t shown up to dinner and usually Shiro would have let her off, knowing that she preferred to eat later, but she hadn’t come for lunch either so he’d sent Lance to go and look for her. Lance, for once, hadn’t complained, worried about his younger teammate. She’d been acting off for the past couple of days; quieter, more withdrawn, and reluctant to move from her workroom. The worst thing was that they hadn’t even questioned it, chalking it up to her finding a new lead on her missing family members. It wasn’t until Lance wandered into her silent room that it dawned on him that something was wrong.

 

He found her curled in the fetal position in the corner of her room, muffled coughs sounding from where she had her face buried in her arms.

“Pidge! What’s the matter? Are you alright?”

 

The tightly curled ball of Pidge moved, seeming to take a great amount of energy to lift her head.

“Lance?... Hurts.”

Her voice was nothing more than a hoarse whisper and he dropped harshly to his knees to move closer to her.  
“What hurts? Pigeon, what hurts?”

 

With a weak groan, she pulled the clenched fist she’d been cradling against her chest away from her body, letting it drop onto the covers beside her. Lance bit his tongue so as not to make a noise. He didn’t want to freak her out. He was pretty sure he was freaked out enough for the both of them.

 

It was like she’d made a stone cast of her hand; a mottled grey covering her skin from the wrist down. Trying to move her as gently as he could, Lance examined her other hand, which had suffered the same fate. Then, just to be sure, he checked her feet which she had _not_ been happy about. He tried to keep his breathing steady - having a breakdown wasn’t going to help Pidge.

 

Finally, although he still wasn’t in the least bit calm, his hands stopped shaking long enough for him to haul Pidge up princess style. _God she was heavy_. He ran as quickly as he could through the Castle, muscles burning as Pidge’s weight bore down on him. _He really needed to use the training room more often._  Bursting through the doors to the main room he yelled for Coran.

 

The Altean hurried towards them, taking the small girl into his arms with ease.

“What’s the problem?”  
Lance drank in deep breaths of air. He was certain he could feel one of his lungs bleeding.

“Her hands. And feet. Stone. Can’t move them.”

 

Coran gave a nod of understanding, marching from the room with Pidge still in his arms, presumably going to the med room. Lance rushed to follow him, clutching the stitch in his side. The clatter of sounds behind him told that the others had followed, dinner forgotten.

  


Time dragged in slow, anxious seconds as Coran ran test after test on Pidge, using frightening looking instruments and bubbling liquids in primary colours. After what seemed like forever he straightened up to address the distressed group.

“She’s been infected with a type of spore which travels within the bloodstream. It’s a parasite that gradually fossilises its host to use as a food source.”

Pidge let out a whimper. Coran ruffled her hair in a comforting manner.

“The pods won’t be able to stop it as it’s an infection rather than an injury and I say we have three quintants at most before the toxin reaches her brain.”  
Shiro’s whine drowned out Pidge’s second whimper.

  
“Can’t we put her in a cryo-pod? The suspended animation would stop the parasite from spreading whilst we find a cure.” Hunk suggested hopefully.

Coran shook his head,

“The cryo pods aren’t designed for short term use, it could potentially damage her system to be completely shut down and then reawoken in such a short time span.”

 

No one offered any more ideas after that and they resumed their stressed silence as they watched Coran take a sample from Pidge’s hand and investigate it underneath a quivering piece of Altean equipment. Several doboshes later he jerked back from the apparatus and Lance felt a sudden surge of hope at the beaming smile stretched across his face.

 

“The spore’s toxin has an antidote! It can be treated with Oclelas, which I know to be available on multiple planets in the Tiagawa 32 star system.”

At his words, Lance felt the vice around his heart ease minutely. Shiro took charge of the situation.

 

“How quickly can we get there?”

Coran typed something into a monitor,

“We can wormhole there in a few ticks and send the team out immediately.”  
“Good.”

 

Shiro continued to talk, pressing Coran for details about the Oclelas. Lance knew he should have been taking in the information but all he could focus on was how still and small Pidge looked, lying on the medbed. Even during the short time it had taken to diagnose her, the chalky grey colour had crept another inch up her body. God, he should have noticed sooner. She was his sister, he should have been looking after her. A ringing filled his ears, blocking out the sound of Shiro’s voice. He should have noticed.

  


The awful numbness that had overtaken his body continued to blanket him until they touched down on the planet - uh - Lance racked his brain for its name. He was pretty sure it began with a ‘U’. Coran must have said it to them a couple of times earlier. Maybe it was an ‘E’. Anyway, the planet didn’t look particularly interesting. It had a pale blue surface that seemed to have the consistency of sand. And that was it. He hadn’t paid attention to what the planet looked like as a whole, but from where the lion had landed all he could see in any direction was sand. Lance was itching to get out of the black lion - Shiro had insisted they only use one and since his was the largest they’d all crammed in together.

 

Despite Lance’s telepathic begging to just get on with it, Shiro stopped them outside the lion to give them some final points about the planet.

“Coran says the locals are peaceful, but remember, his information is ten thousand years old and _any_ species can act violently if provoked. _So make sure you don’t provoke them_.”

His eyes seemed to linger on Keith for a fraction longer than anyone else. Keith’s resting scowl deepened into his trademarked death glare. Lance bit back a laugh; now wasn’t the time to antagonise the red paladin.

 

Shiro continued,

“Allura should have sent an image of the Oclelas to your helmets for reference. It grows in cool, dark areas and at this time of year it will be emitting white bubbles. Do not touch the bubbles, okay? Lance, did you get that.”

Lance snapped his head up from where he’d been examining his shoes.

“Yeah, got it. Damp space, bubbles good. -But you do realise we’re in a desert? How are we supposed to find ‘ _cool dark areas.'_ ”

He made air quotes with his fingers. A muscle in Shiro’s forehead twitched.

“Coran promised me the plant was easy to find. Look for it deep within one of the patches of forest that cover the planet. If we split up we can cover more ground but I want you all to keep your Comms open. I don’t want anyone getting hurt or lost.”

 

“Ay ay.”

Lance gave a half-serious salute and began walking away from the black lion at an angle. He was going to find the Occyas before anyone else.

  
  
  


Three vargas later and all Lance wanted to find was his bed. If it was for anything else he would have given up a _long_ time ago but this was for Pidge. Sure, he was going to give her hell for this later but all that mattered for the moment was that he found the Ocylolas. Every now and then Shiro would patch in to make sure everyone was doing okay. They were, but no one had found the goddam plant. Lance had actually found _no_ goddam plants and he would have regretted taking that direction, if he hadn’t for the past half varga been approaching a large area of vegetation that looked to stretch far above his head. When he eventually reached its entrance he could only crane his head up at the dark mass of curling foliage.

 

He entered it cautiously, drawing his bayard, although he was mainly using it for light. The towering plants completely blocked out the planets twin suns and he’d barely walked fifty feet before he was in pitch darkness. The stillness of his surroundings unnerved him. How could a planet be so empty? No insects, no animals, nothing but the plants.

 

Lance didn't do well in solidarity. What could he say, he was a social creature? The last few weeks had been hard. Everyone had been walking on eggshells around both him and Keith, ignoring the elephant in the room and hoping that they’d work it out themselves. Obviously, they hadn’t. Lance’s only solace was Pidge, simply because she did not give a fuck. It wasn’t that she didn’t care about him but as she’d said, ‘ _Whatever's going on between you and Keith has nothing to do with me. Why would I treat you different?’_ In an act of high emotion, Lance had sobbed into her shoulder. She’d been sworn into secrecy never to speak of it.

  


“Guys I’ve found it!” Hunk yelled down the line and Lance let out a high pitched shriek. It was such a contrast to the quiet of the forest.

“Lance,” Shiro chided, “Stay alert.”

It sounded like he was suppressing a snort. Fuck Shiro.

 

“Shiiiiiirooooo,” Hunk whined, “I’ve found the Oclelas. It’s leaking bubbles and everything.”  
“Great work Hunk. Put as many of the leaves as you can into the bio bag. Coran only needs a few but better safe than sorry. And don’t touch the bubbles!”

“Got it.”

 

Lance stood awkwardly in the darkness as Hunk’s breathing filled the line, wondering if he was supposed to turn back.

“Lance, why are you so far out?”

“What?”

“I’m checking our positions - Hunk, Keith and I are all within a varga of the black lion but you’re miles away. What happened?”

 

Lance felt the, regrettably familiar, shame of disappointing Shiro soak into him, despite having no control over the situation.

“It took me ages to get to an area with plants. I was walking in the desert forever.”

Hunk made a sympathetic sound,

“Luck of the draw, buddy.”

 

“Why didn’t you go back to base? It’ll take too long to wait for you to return. We don’t know how Pidge’s condition has developed and we need to get those leaves to Coran as soon as possible.”

Lance swallowed; time to take one for the team.

“It’s cool. You guys go ahead and get Pidge her magic leaves. I’ll make my way back to the meetup point and you pick me up when you’re done, kay?”  
  
“Alright, good call.”  
Lance tried not to feel hurt at the absolute zero protest Shiro had put up to leaving him behind. He was stressed about Pidge, they all were, and Lance could tough out a few vargas on a mystery planet. He was a big boy.

“Lance. Once we leave the planet’s atmosphere the Comms will cut off. We’ll try to return as soon as possible so don’t freak out.”

_Ha, Shiro did care about him! Suck it universe!_

“It’s fine, no worries. Just sand and leaves here, nothing to worry ‘bout.”

“Thank you Lance. Okay, everyone start heading back to the lion. Keith, if you don’t get back before Hunk I’m going to have to leave you here as well, got it?”

Keith’s grunt of acknowledgment surprised Lance. Up till then he’d been so quiet Lance had forgotten he was there.

  


As soon as Shiro had given the word, Lance turned on his heel and began marching back out of the forest as fast as he could. Blue deserts he could deal with, freaky silent forests not so much. This boy wanted some sunlight. Anyway, he still had around an hour before the others took off, maybe he could make the distance.

  


He was so focused on his power walking that he didn’t even feel the blow to the back of his neck. He was unconscious before he hit the ground.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> that took a hellavu lot longer than it should have. nyeh.


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so, you thought you'd seen the last of me, huh?

No one spoke as they flew back to the castle. The atmosphere was tense and uncomfortable, Keith had arrived back only seconds before Hunk and the three paladins had then piled into the black lion. Keith knew Shiro was stressed about leaving Lance to fend for himself on an unknown planet. He himself had mixed feelings about it, but the most important thing they had to worry about for the moment was bringing the Oclelas to Pidge.

 

The rush of moving through the hangers and into the med room passed in a blur. Keith was unable to do anything but follow Shiro blindly and trust that he at least knew what he was doing. _Like any of them actually knew what they were doing_. He let the other two enter before him, giving himself a few extra seconds to steel his nerve.

 

Pidge was lying in the same position she’d been in when they’d left, vargas earlier. The decay caused by the fungi had grown a lot since then; the stony grey having crept beyond the sleeves of her shirt and up the hem of her shorts.

He had no idea how far the disease spread underneath her clothing. His comfort was the fact that the colour hadn’t yet reached her neck. They still had time.

 

Coran bustled around the med room, multi-colored bursts of steam erupting in his wake, and although the others seemed fine just watching him work, Keith couldn’t stand feeling so useless.

 

Unable to bear seeing Pidge looking like that for any longer, he left the room, going towards the training room to work of his frustration. That was starting to become a bad habit for him.

 

He didn’t bother changing from his paladin suit, despite it being hot and uncomfortable. Sand from the planet still clung to the outside of his armour and his undersuit stuck unpleasantly to his body from vargas of dried sweat - the regulated temperature of the suits could only do so much.

 

But Keith ignored all of this, focused on taking down the automated gladiators one by one.

  
  
  


Less than a Varga later he’d had to stop to take a rest. His eyes itched and his arms were prickling uncomfortably. He wasn’t sure if it was pins and needles or just cramps. It had felt like a bit of a blow to his pride before he reminded himself that he’d just spent hours trekking through an alien forest. Normally he could train for much longer. Yet his arms continued to throb and he decided quickly that swinging a heavy sword around wasn’t going to help.

 

He ended up wandering the Castle’s corridors, unwilling to return to the tense silence of the med room. That is, until he nearly collided with Shiro who looked happier than Keith had seen him in days.

“Keith! There you are, Coran’s nearly finished with the antidote. He’s giving it to Pidge any minute now. I thought you’d want to be there.”

Keith shot him a grateful smile, which required more effort than it should really have had to. He followed the paladin back towards the others, absentmindedly rubbing at his arms to try and rid himself of the itch that had set itself deep beneath his skin.

  


Pidge lay still on the medbed. The fungi was beginning to make its way up her neck and Keith felt a sudden wave of gratitude that he hadn’t stayed to watch the antidote being made. The waiting would probably have killed him. He hated having to see her like that.

 

The only thing he could do to help was stroke her hand as Coran fed her an unappetising looking mixture. It had the consistency of rancid milk; soft chunks of solid floating within a thick gelatin liquid. She immediately screwed up her face at the taste and Keith honestly couldn’t blame her.

“Urgh-” Coran clamped his hand across her mouth as she gagged, whilst Hunk timidly patted her back. A couple of seconds of vicious fighting passed before she finally managed to throw him off,

“What the fuck?”

 

Coran gave her a sympathetic smile, nursing his bitten hand.

“Sorry about the taste, just allow the antidote to circulate your system a few times. It should only take a couple of doboshes before it starts destroying the fungi. Unfortunately, it’s going to take a lot of energy out of you, so you should get some rest.”

 

Pidge half looked like she wanted to argue with him, but decided against it, slumping further down into the medbed as a yawn worked its way up her throat. The team watched over her as the antidote worked its way through her body and she fell into unconsciousness.

  


Coran soon resumed his work with the Altean medical instruments whilst Shiro and Hunk began an awkward, stilted conversation that neither paladin was putting much effort into. Keith could feel his fingers twitching. The buzzing in his arms had slowly gotten worse and twirls of static periodically wound their way down his legs. It seemed to be concentrating around his shoulder and he might have been more worried if Pidge’s life wasn’t in the balance.

 

Finally, the Altean turned back to Pidge, rolling her sleeve up her arm again. For all Keith knew, it looked exactly the same as it had ten minutes ago, but Coran’s face split into a relieved grin.

“The fungus is receding, she’s going to be fine.”

 

The fear that had smoked its way through the room evaporated. Allura was beaming, Hunk was unashamedly sobbing and Keith could have sworn he saw Shiro do a small fist pump.

 

“Now where’s Lance? I’m sure he’s been worried sick.” The three still-conscious paladins froze at Coran’s would be innocent question.

“Fuck!” The Alteans gaped at Shiro, who once again wore a look of distress.

“We had to leave him on the planet, he was too far away from Black. I was going to send Keith or Hunk to collect him as soon as we got back but I was distracted. Shit. We can’t communicate with him, he’s too far out of range. Right, Keith, you come with me. Hunk, you stay here, don’t argue with me, I know that you’ve injured your leg.”

Hunk jumped at the accusation,

“It’s not- I just twisted it. I fell on the way back, it doesn’t even hurt.”

“Hunk, Lance will be _fine_ , but if he hears you went out injured because of him, we’ll _all_ have hell to pay. Understand?”

Hunk nodded, defeatedly. Shiro turned to Keith,

“Lets go.”

  
  
  


Keith watched Shiro pilot the black lion. It was nothing like the way he flew Red. He directed his own lion through passion and impulse. Shiro was meticulous. He used the controls with such an intimidating amount of confidence that Keith felt childish in comparison.

 

Time passed slowly and Keith had to resist the urge to cough as a tickling feeling sprung in the back of his throat. The feeling only intensified until he eventually gave up and cleared his throat, hoping to rid himself of the irritating sensation. The cough had no effect and Keith was forced into taking deeper breaths as a pressure seemed to build in his chest.

“-eith? Keith? What’s the matter?”

Shiro had twisted in his pilot's chair, snapping his fingers in front of Keith’s face.

 

Keith couldn’t reply. The suffocating feeling working its way up his throat as he finally realised what it was.

 

“ _Lance_.”

  
  


______________________________________________________________________________

  
  
  


Lance was lying face down on the floor, arms and legs bound tightly to his body. He felt like he was performing a shitty cosplay of a chrysalis.

 

He was getting horrible Nyma flashbacks.

 

All he wanted to do was struggle the bindings off, but his instincts were screaming to him that he wasn’t alone. A voice that sounded uncomfortably like Shiro’s was telling him to _asses the situation before you make a move,_ so he remained still. He was eventually rewarded for his patience by the slight shuffling sounds his helmet was picking up. There was something moving around him.

  


Lance could hear faint growling noises. He strained his ears to hear them, crossing his fingers in his head that his Universal Translator would pick up on them. The normally soothing voice that came from his headset dashed those hopes. She spoke with a clear, pleasant voice that carried a slight lisp of an Altean accent.

  


He’d woken up in a panic one night realising the woman the voice belonged to was ten thousand years dead. He’d crawled into Hunk’s bed in tears. It wasn’t one of his proudest moments.

  


“-Language unknown. Sounds carry similarities to fourteen other probable dialects. These are; Oisali, Zeozzaxesh, Ulfeti, Miekese, Ezundin-”

 

Lance’s rising panic filled his head with a buzzing that drowned out the remainder of her list.

“Would you like a fragmentary translation based on the listed languages?”

Lance murmured out a yes, terrified of alerting the creatures to his consciousness. He didn’t know how many of the aliens were out there and with his luck, they all had super hearing and a taste for human flesh.

 

The sounds filtering through his helmet were getting louder, the aliens coming closer.

  
“Drag - - construct - - inert - - vivisection”

The universal translator spat out words at random, doing its best to interpret the unknown language. The words were bad. They were bad words and Lance was in trouble. Shit, he probably should have realised that when he woke up hogtied. Face down, ass up, he was going to die and his last thought was going to be a fucking sex meme.

 

He fired quick questions at his headset, his terror making it nearly impossible to keep his voice at a whisper.

“What planet is this?”

“Planet unknown.”  
“What species inhabit this planet?”  
“Planet’s species unknown.”

“Can I breathe the air?!”

“Planet’s atmospheric composition unkn-”  
“Unknown. I know I know. Can you do a silent scan of the atmosphere?”

 

The voice didn’t reply instantly, as if it was pondering the question. Or maybe Lance’s hysteria was clouding his timekeeping abilities.

“Atmospheric scan available. Starting now.”

Lance waited as an almost inaudible buzz began. The snarls and grunts of the aliens around him continued and he was almost thankful that they were no longer being translated.

 

“Scan complete. The atmospheric composition contains eighty-four percent Reite, fourteen percent Oxygen, two percent Mesoidine and trace amounts of Copive, Neon, and Iodine. Partial pressure of Oxygen is at fourteen point five kPa whilst-”  
“So can I breathe it?” His aggravated hiss sounded rude even to his own ears, but he was in a high-pressure situation so he figured he’d be given a pass.

 

“The element Reite has a similar composition to Nitrogen, being colourless, odorless, tasteless and generally inert. Oxygen is at a lower percentile whilst Mesoidine is higher. The air will be breathable for two to three Vargas without immediate medical help. Four to five Vargas of breathing would be feasible with a recommended two vargas of recovery inside a medical pod, whilst any time over six vargas will cause irreparable damage to the human respiratory system.”

  


No sooner had she said that, a shock of pain flooded his shoulder. Something had pierced his armour, stabbing into his arm. He bit his lip so hard he tasted blood, to avoid making a sound. The seal of air circulating his suit had been broken and a rush of cool air stung the newly formed cut. He desperately tried not to think about the hundreds of alien infections he could be contracting. The next breath he took felt thinner, sharper; rattling through his chest.

 

He had less than six Vargas.

  
  
  
  


The thought had barely made its panicked way through his head before he felt another slash cut through his other arm. This time he was unable to hold back the scream that wrenched its way up his throat. There was a pause, _oh God they knew._

His attacker manhandled him onto his back, knocking the wind out of his lungs and before he could retrieve it, they slammed the butt of their weapon down onto Lance’s visor. Something thin pierced the glass, slicing the tip of his nose. Lance felt a burst of pressure before the Altean glass crumbled into dust, the majority of it falling into his eyes.

 

That shouldn’t have been able to happen. The visor was supposed to be able to withstand the cold vacuum of space; why had a small explosive been able to destroy it?

 

Now that his suit had been punctured, the restraints wrapping his body tightened painfully, cutting into his skin in a way that the circulating air pockets that had previously protected him hadn’t allowed. Even through the armour of his suit, his skin stung, like rubbing alcohol into an open wound.

 

A fierce tug at his ankles cut short any previous thoughts. Lance had no time to prepare himself before he was moving; his now exposed face dragging across the dusty terrain. He screwed his eyes shut, ignoring the burn from the residual dust of his dissolved visor. He could tell that they were moving downwards from the way the planet’s gravity aided their descent, until a second captor lifted him into the air using the bindings around his arms. This placed a new pressure onto his wounds and Lance almost tore a hole in his mouth from how hard he was biting his lip.

  


The swinging was far worse than being dragged. Lance mentally apologised for every time he’d made fun of Hunk for his weak stomach. He tried to crack an eyelid open, through the watering of his eyes but everything was pitch black and in a panic Lance wondered if he’d gone blind. He opened his eyes wider, desperately, only to have to force them closed over the dust due to the sudden onslaught of light.

 

He blinked rapidly in an effort to clear his vision. They were traveling through a labyrinth of underground tunnels and he needed to have at least some idea on how to get out. Normally he could rely on Pidge and the suit’s trackers but Pidge was out of commission and the tracker was built into their helmets. He had no clue how damaged the tech was, but even then (don’t tell Pidge) it wasn’t always reliable in large depths.

 

During an alliance meeting on a water-based planet, Keith had gotten lost wandering off on his own. The depths of the planets ocean had messed with Pidge’s scanner and the team hadn’t found him for vargas. Pidge had been quick to defend her creation, ‘ _There’s nothing wrong with the scanner, but it can only do so much if you’re a fucking idiot!”_ Lance loved that little bastard. He prayed to whatever space Gods out there that the others had reached her. That she was alright.

  
  
  


They must have been traveling for vargas and Lance had slowly been finding it harder to breathe. It was as if the air had steadily been getting denser and it was taking more and more effort to pull it into his lungs. The pain in his arms was excruciating, the way they’d been bound cutting off the blood circulation as well as putting pressure on the wounds in his arms. Lance was fairly sure he’d contracted five different types of space tetanus. He couldn’t help optimistically wondering if the creatures hogtied every person they met. For all he knew the people were simply harmless BDSM enthusiasts whose introduction to their culture had gotten lost in translation.

 

Lance decided that clutching at straws was not a good look on him.

 

For a while he just watched as small droplets of blood dripped from his shoulders and disappeared into the dust. It was mesmerising. The skin pulled tight underneath the bindings _burned_. They must have been made of some type of toxin; it was as if his skin was blistering off of his body. Yet he remained hanging limp within his restraints. Every now and then he caught glimpses of his captors. They scuttled like centipedes, an unsettling amount of legs kicking up the dust around them.

  


Soon, Lance felt their so far steady decline steepen as even the lights from the alien’s city faded out. The air was stale and dry, scratching its way down his throat. He briefly wondered how much time he had left, maybe a couple of vargas. Then they stopped, jerking the ties harshly across his already damaged skin, making the pain that wrapped his body flare up anew.

 

Without fanfare, he was dropped to the floor; unable to see his captors exit in the darkness of the room. He lay still, straining to pick up any sounds around him and desperately trying to swallow down the urge to cry. He was so fucking scared.

 

Lance was normally in Blue or with the others; fuelled by adrenaline and with everything moving so quickly he didn’t have time to wrap his head around how close he was dancing towards death.

 

Now he had all the time in the world.

  
  
  


Minutes passed with no signs of the aliens returning and, like it or not, Lance knew he had to act. Although he couldn’t move his arms from where they were tied to his back, his bayard was still in reach. He’d wanted to use it earlier but between his injuries, the aggressive swaying and his lack of information regarding his situation, he’d been too afraid to try.

 

The familiar buzz of his bayard activating felt stupidly comforting. He couldn’t exactly aim but Lance figured there was nothing wrong with a bit of blind shooting. He tried to contort his body as much as he could into a ‘ _not-a-target’_ like shape, but he still had no clue what direction the blast would go.

 

The first shot missed wildly, causing a considerable amount of dust to rain down from what must have been the ceiling. However, the second shot definitely hit something because the bindings wrapping his body fell slack and the tension dropped from his body for the first time in hours. Unfortunately, the second shot also definitely hit him.

 

He carefully unfurled his cramped limbs, wincing as blood began to rush through them again. At the pain in his leg, Lance twisted to get a look at the cut that ran down his calf. Considering the circumstances, he’d gotten off pretty lightly but it still stung like a bitch. The gash ran fairly deep and he knew it would hinder his running. Still, it was a small price to play for his freedom.

 

Lance allowed thirty ticks to collect himself, sitting back on his arms and looking up at the domed ceiling.

“Fuck. Que te jodan. Stupid fucking pedazo de mierda. No merezco esto, for fucks sake. Argh.”

He breathed in once. Breathed out once. Then squinted through the darkness at what had to be the remains of whatever had been restraining him.

 

They were shriveled and grey and looked like they could have been a type of plant. Or, more likely, a parasite. He optimistically asked the Altean headset to identify it, receiving only silence in response. That would be the second time the voice died. Shit, he needed to get back to Hunk, that was _dark_.

  


He stumbled unsteadily to his feet, cautious not to touch the dead-looking plant. The still-lingering pains in his arms and legs lay fresh in his mind. Guess he’d be avoiding space broccoli for a while.

 

He spun the room slowly, avoiding putting too much weight on his injured leg. His eyes were still getting used to the darkness; the room was a stark contrast to the bright lights of the underground city and he no longer had the luxury of night vision. The problem was, the more he could see of the room, the more it looked like a horror movie set.

 

Shapes littered the floor; vaguely humanoid bodies tied the same way Lance had been. The creatures were the same ashy colour as the vine ropes, camouflaging the restraints against their bodies.

 

_Here goes nothing._

 

Gripping his bayard, Lance approached one of the bound figures. Not daring to touch them, he knelt in front of what he hoped was its head.

“Hey, I’m here to help. The name’s Lance, I’m a paladin of Voltron. Uh, the blue one, actually. If you can understand me, can you please move?”

 

He waited, but the body didn’t move. Lance was antsy to get out of there, he was getting seriously bad vibes about the place and he didn’t want to wait for tall, dark and invertebrate to return.

 

Ah, fuck it.

 

He shot his bayard again at the vines wrapping the alien, watching in fascinated horror as they immediately withered to death upon losing their host. With the bindings no longer supporting them, the alien slumped bonelessly to the floor.

 

From the dim light of his bayard, Lance saw a laceration in the alien’s arm, the same place he’d been cut. Thick amber fluid dripped like sap from the wound. Lance leant closer to try and determine just how severe the cut was, but recoiled just as quickly. The scent of decay had hit him like wall and his bad feelings about the room multiplied.

 

He was in a meat locker.

  
  
  


He staggered away from the body, stomach heaving. The very effort of breathing sent a bolt of pain through his chest at every inhale and coloured spots popped periodically across his vision. His six vargas were up and with that came the sick realisation that the team might never even find his body.

 

He was going to die and it wouldn’t be from fighting the Galra, or defending the universe. It was from running out of air on an unknown planet. And this wasn’t about going out in a blaze of glory as a martyred hero. It was the knowledge that he was going to die alone and his mama would never know what happened to him.

 

He lurched forward suddenly, heavy coughs spraying the dust with drops of blood. His eyesight blurred and he fell to the ground face first. Blades tore his throat at every inhale and at some point he just stopped trying, giving in to the pull of the shadows.

 

Maybe death would stop him from hurting.

  
  


______________________________________________________________________________

  
  
  


He woke up.

 

You’re not supposed to do that if you’re dead.

 

Nevermind, everything still hurt, he couldn’t have died.

 

Dying would have been too easy.

 

The air felt different once more. Lighter. Like it was back on the Castle. He didn’t stop to question it, who knew how long he had before the pain came back. His chest continued to ache but it was nothing like the agony it had been only minutes ago.

 

Weaving his way through the bodies of the aliens, Lance headed towards the dim light of the doorway leading out of the room. The musk of death clung to him as he passed and he did his best not to gag.

  


If you asked him afterwards, Lance couldn’t have told you how he escaped from the alien’s nest. It was a combination of dumb luck and - nope, that’s about it.

 

The city was built like a corkscrew; a maze of pathways descending in a spiral. As a result, all Lance had to do was run upwards. He avoided the alien cities, running through a barren unpopulated area along the side of the rock. It must have been an extreme shortcut, his sprint upwards was nothing like the hours of slow descent. No one tried to stop him; the centipede-like creatures didn’t think he was still _alive,_ let alone trying to escape. By the time they’d been alerted, he was nearing the top. They caught up to him on the final curve of pathway, one of them grabbing at his arm. Lance shot it off. He was too close.

  


He could hear scuttling footsteps behind him as he burst through the tunnel connecting the underground city to the surface, and pushed himself to move faster. One of the planet’s forest belts sat close to where he exited so he made that into his goal, voluntarily entering the false night once again. Even inside the jungle he kept running, fear and adrenaline forcing him forward as vines scratched against his suit.

 

He didn’t know how long he’d been going before his body gave out on him and he collapsed. His head was buried in a patch of shrubbery soft enough that he didn’t move away at first, panting into the spongy plant. He opened his eyes again at the moist silky feeling brushing his face.

“Oh, the bubble plant. Pidge needs that.”

 

The bubbles itched as they sunk into his skin but Lance couldn’t move his hands to brush them off. They popped against his face, colours slowly getting brighter as they did. His head spun and the next time he breathed in, it was the same thick, heavy air as when the alien had first broken his helmet. Strange.

 

Lance giggled, able to move his body once more and tripping over his feet to stand. The plants surrounding him dripped like warm butter, flooding the path around him. He had to jump now or the liquid would get him.

 

Insects flew past, flapping wings larger than Lance. He breathed in the bouncy air, feeling it spiral into his chest.

 

He needed to go

 

Needed to run

 

The forest trickled down the drain until he was back in the big blue. Not as big as his Blue. But a big big blue

 

He didn’t like it

 

Blue wasn’t meant to be alone

 

The blue needed friends

 

Knives scratched at his throat as he searched for the friends - maybe they were hiding

 

_Noise_

 

Big noise

 

He followed the noise and a red and a black came from the noise.

 

That was good

 

The blue needed friends

 

He reached for his friends and the red made him fly

 

“Don’t leave blue alone.” He told him sternly “You always leave blue alone.”

 

Then he closed his eyes because the black was safe and the red was safe and now the blue was safe.

  
  


______________________________________________________________________________

  
  
  


_“Lance.”_

 

The phantom pain that he’d been feeling for hours was Lance’s. Keith coughed again, the action doing nothing to get rid of the semi-tightness in his throat. He should have realised sooner but he’d never felt it so strong. Something inside of him was telling him that this was serious. That somewhere, Lance was hovering between life and death.

 

He needed to act. Fast.

 

Keith ignored Shiro’s questions, focusing all of his energy into thoughts of Lance. Of helping, of protecting, of pushing the blue paladin behind him and taking the pain in his place. He reached towards the fraying bond between them once again, cradling it to his chest, feeling power thrum across it. Keith felt a deep ache in his lungs; Lance couldn’t breathe.

 

But _he_ could.

 

Not entirely sure if what he was doing was right, Keith concentrated on drawing in a deep breath, picturing Lance doing the same. He imagined switching their places in his head. Giving Lance his air.

 

It was not a pleasant feeling. The air in his mouth suddenly felt thick and cloying, like he was attempting to swallow a scarf instead of water. But he kept going. It was nearly impossible to keep up the exchange, all of his focus put into maintaining the connection, but until he found Lance there was no way he was letting the fucker die.

 

“-Keith what’s wrong? What’s wrong with Lance?”

Oh yeah, Shiro must have been freaked out, Keith had had his eyes screwed shut for a few minutes now and he hadn’t moved an inch. He should probably reassure the guy that he hadn’t had a space seizure.

 

“ _Fuck off,_ Shiro.”

The paladin asked another question but frankly, Keith wasn’t in the mood to hear it.

“It’s Lance. He can’t breathe. I’m helping. Fly faster.”

“Uh-Okay.”

 

For the next who knows how many doboshes or varga, Keith leant back in his chair and concentrated only on trading oxygen with Lance. He didn’t dare try anything else. It felt like he was trying to keep hold of a struggling fish, barely in control as it fought to slip from his grasp.

 

“Keith?” Shiro’s voice was barely a whisper, “I’ve got Lance’s location, he’s nearing the outskirts of one of the forest patches. I don’t know why but the tracker in his helmet is no longer working so I’m having to use the secondary tracker. We’ll be planetside in a few minutes, do you want to stay in Black?”

 

Keith didn’t get a chance to answer, clutching his head as a small spasm ran through his body, snapping the connection between him and Lance. It felt like someone had scratched their fingers across his brain. He breathed in, the recycled oxygen flowing through Black a welcome relief to the nauseating thickness of whatever was in the atmosphere of the desert planet. That Lance was now breathing in again.

 

Panicked, he tried reinstating the connection but he couldn’t focus-

“Keith? Keith?!”

“I’M FINE. Hurry up and land, we need to find Lance. Something's happened to him, I had to break the link.”

Keith felt his voice break in several places but thankfully, Shiro didn’t comment; pushing Black into a steeper landing.

  


Keith could see Lance through Black’s screen before they’d even landed. He was walking weirdly, like he wasn’t fully in control of his body and Keith half thought he was going to pitch over into the sapphire sand dunes.

 

They landed quickly and Keith didn’t even wait for Black’s engines to stop humming before bursting out of the lion’s mouth. Lance noticed him immediately, looking up with unfocused eyes. He moved forward jerkily, smiling in half-recognition whilst Keith stayed frozen; eyes locked on the gruesome mass of flaking blood clinging to his armour.

 

Lance reached him just as Shiro exited from Black.

“Lance!”

Lance giggled, gazing at Keith with a wonder usually reserved for children before, without warning, collapsing forward. Keith hoisted him up princess style, tucking the paladin into his chest. The planet must have had a lower gravitational pull than they were used to, Lance was easier to carry then he should have been.

 

The boy in question leant closer into his grip, saying with passion,

“Don’t leave blue alone. You always leave blue alone.”

His eyes looked misted - tears threatening to spill down his cheeks - until he seemed to decide against it and fell asleep instead. Or maybe he died.

 

Spurred on by fear, Keith bundled Lance into Black, Shiro following close behind, babbling an impressive blend of curses and instructions on how to perform the Heimlich maneuver. They took off faster than they had landed, Shiro piloting whilst Keith made quick work of stripping Lance down to his undersuit. He needed to get a better look at the injuries in the blue paladin’s arm.

 

Making a snap decision, Keith ripped off the sleeves of Lance’s undersuit, trying his hardest not to let them touch the wound as he rolled them down the paladin’s arms. He wasn’t entirely sure if Lance was lucid enough to appreciate that but he figured it was good manners to do it anyway.

 

The wounds looked pretty deep, someone had made them with intent, but Keith’s eyes seemed only able to focus on the bone white of the letters scratched into his flesh. He had to fight back a sudden wave of nausea, turning his head away from the injured paladin.

 

He drew in a few slow breaths before turning back, making sure only to look at the fresh injuries. Luckily for Lance, they didn’t seem to be as bad as Keith had first thought. The cuts weren’t pretty but at least he knew Lance wasn’t going to bleed out before they got back to the Castle. He’d just need a quick trip to the pods. No, the cuts weren’t the problem, Keith was far more worried about the air Lance had been breathing for an unknown amount of hours.

  
  
  


Keith felt a certain amount of deja-vu at bursting into the Castle to the worried faces of the Alteans. This time, however, he was carrying a body in his arms.

“What happened?”

Coran’s face was ashy but Keith didn’t stop walking towards the medical rooms,

“He needs a pod. His helmet was broken and I don’t know how long he was breathing the air, but he was acting _weird_ before he passed out.”

“How so?”

“Uh - his eyes weren’t focussing and I don’t think he knew who I was-”

Keith entered the pod room, lifting Lance up as gently as he could into the nearest pod.

 

Coran nodded at the information, typing something in Altean into the pods’ touchpad. He silently read the machine’s evaluation whilst the others waited for him to speak. Yup, Keith definitely felt like he’d been in this position before. After a couple of minutes, Coran turned to the group,

“Lance is going to be fine, but he’ll need three or four vargas in the pod. He seems to have inhaled a large amount of Oclelas ovule, as well as receiving traces of tainine into his blood through lacerations in his arms. Luckily for him, Aeliv’s air is similar enough to Earth’s atmosphere that he won’t have any permanent damage, although several areas of his respiratory system have been partially eroded.”

 

Hunk gave a little squeak. Keith hadn’t noticed him enter. It didn’t matter, Lance was going to be fine. He took that as his cue to leave, making a beeline for his room.

  
  
  


Once inside he didn’t even bother removing his shoes, dropping down onto the bed and pressing his hands into his eyes. His head ached. There was a strong need to be inside the pod room thrumming through his body. To protect Lance. It had been a lot to take in. The terror of not knowing what was happening to the blue paladin, the fear of the unknown. And the relief at being able to help him.

 

The worst thing was, deep down he knew it wasn’t some bullshit side effect of the soulmate bond. All those ridiculous protective desires came from Keith and Keith alone.

 

_“Don’t leave blue alone. You always leave blue alone.”_

 

Keith groaned loudly, punching his pillow into a more comfortable sleeping shape and praying that all those stupid, conflicting, confusing thoughts would disappear if he fell asleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yeah, yeah, I know it's been forever. GCSE's are kicking my ass. Anyway there's no way I'm going to abandon this but updates are gonna be slower. What can you do?  
> Hope ya'll are having a great time and I'm sure I'll be back soon.  
> peace.
> 
> Also hit me up at my tumblr if you want: https://murderousbutunmotivated.tumblr.com/
> 
> seriously I have two followers and one (1) is a pornbot so it's doing wonders for my self esteem


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another installment, hold onto your hats and/or offspring

When Lance finally emerged from the pod, Keith was the only person in the room. This was no coincidence - Keith had taken painful liberties to ensure it. By that he meant begging. A lot of begging. And even that wouldn’t have gotten him anywhere if Pidge hadn’t backed him up; falling out of her pod halfway through his argument with Shiro, somehow picking up on what they were fighting about and immediately joining in to support Keith, like the world’s best push up bra. All four foot nine of her just daring Shiro to refuse her. He hadn’t.

 

Keith had spent the following vargas developing a crick in his back from sitting crouched on the pod rooms’ stairs. At first, he’d tried watching the sleeping paladin’s face, but he quickly decided that that was incredibly creepy and crossed a lot of personal boundaries. Hence the crick.

  


The hiss of the pod door opening came too soon and he suddenly found himself with an armful of disorientated Lance. The paladin blinked up at him sleepily; eyes taking longer than usual to focus.

“Keef?”

Lance slurred drunkenly. Keith’s mouth was dry, too dry to answer. Sahara dry. Jalapão dry. Taklamakan. Tanami. Mojave.

 

“Where am I?”

Lance twisted in Keith’s arms,

“Where are they? Oh shit, where are they?!”

Keith tightened his hold around the panicked boy, which in retrospect probably wasn’t the best course of action.

“Lance, calm down, you’re fine. You’re in the Castle. We left that planet some star systems back. They’re gone.”

All of the tension left Lance’s body and he relaxed bonelessly into Keith. Not knowing what else to do, the red paladin awkwardly patted his back.

 

“You!” All of Lance’s previous energy returned as he sat up, staring at Keith with accusation burning in his gaze.

“You saved me.”

Keith blinked. The words didn’t seem to match the aggression behind them.  
“It’s nothing, you’re not very heavy. Don’t worry about-”

“No. Before that. Back on the planet, the air was toxic. I was going to die, I _should_ have died, but somehow I started breathing again. That was you, wasn’t it?”  
Keith swallowed; had he mentioned his mouth was dry?

“Yeah, that was me.”

 

“Why?”

 

His reply died in his throat - how was he supposed to answer that; had their friendship really been so damaged that Lance was asking him why he hadn’t left the blue paladin alone to suffocate on an unknown planet?

“I couldn’t let you die. Not if I could have stopped it.”

It was a hell of an understatement, but there were some things Keith still wasn’t ready to share.

 

“Isn’t that a bit hypocritical?”

Keith would have expected there to be more acid behind Lance’s words but the boy just sounded vaguely curious.

“You would rather have died?”

Lance gave a half laugh,

“Not particularly, but that’s never stopped you before.”

He scratched at his bare arm absentmindedly and Keith’s stomach clenched; eyes drawn to the angry scarring.

 

“I’m sorry.”

Lance frowned,

“What?”

“Your arms. Back then. I’m sorry. Everything I said about you. I’m so sorry.”  
To his horror, Keith found his voice cracking, tears pricking his eyes.

“Shit. I tried-I tried to. God, I’m so sorry. I had no right. I could have lost you. I’m sorry, I’m sorry.”

Apologies mixed with broken sobs and he screwed his eyes closed, unwilling to look at Lance’s face for any longer. A hand stroking his head reopened them. Lance had moved closer towards him, cradling his head against his chest, the dampness pressed against his neck telling him that the blue paladin was crying as well. Heh, bonding moment.

 

_Lance was sitting in his lap_

  
  
  


For a long time, neither one of them moved, soaking the room with their pain and regrets. Keith had to break the silence,

“I get it now. Why you did it. Can’t say it was right, but I’m sorry. For taking it out on you. For leaving you.”

“Then don’t do it again.”

Lance’s voice was firm but it still sounded more like a plea than an order.

 

“Let’s start again. Not as soulmates, or rivals; just us.”

Lance looked him in the eyes, considering it. It was fucking uncomfortable but Keith toughed it out. Seeming to come to a final decision, the blue paladin held out a hand. Keith eyeballed it, making no move to touch it.

“What are you doing?”

“You said we should start over, so, hi I’m Lance.”

“I know who you are. What are you doing?”

 

Lance scowled, the skin across his cheeks darkening as he withtrackted his outstretched hand.

“I saw it in a film; thought it looked cool..”

Keith couldn’t hear the rest of the sentence as he trailed off into an embarrassed mutter. Shit, that wasn’t what he wanted, Lance was closing himself off-

 

“What’s your favourite animal?!”

 

He blurted out the words. Too fast. Too loud. Somehow Keith managed not to cringe at the sound of his own voice, refusing to drop his gaze from Lance’s face.

 

“What?”

 

“What’s your favourite animal? Mine’s a hippo; they’re the third largest land mammal after white rhinoceros and elephants.”

He snapped his mouth shut, ending his rambling. Keith had done his part; now the ball was in Lance’s court. The Lance in question floundered for a little while longer, then shook his head.

“No it’s not.”

“It’s not what?”

“Your favourite animal. It can’t be a hippo. Your favourite animal is a fish.”

 

_Huh?_

 

Seeing his expression, Lance pulled up a tab on his bayard so fast that Keith knew he had to have already had it open.

 

“That.” Said Lance, looking way too pleased with himself. “Is a red mullet.”

  
  
  


It was still awkward. For fucking weeks it was awkward. Keith danced around Lance like he was made of glass whilst Lance just didn’t seem to know how to talk to him. It made training a nightmare for everyone, and yet they were somehow forming Voltron stronger than they ever had before. Pidge had made a lot of snide comments about that, the most memorable being during dinner one night after training, _‘If we’re this powerful from those nerds awkward friendship, can you imagine what it would be like if they fucked?'_ Shiro had had to leave the room, scandalised.

 

Yet slowly they started to build up a tenuous friendship, this one unmarred by bitterness or resent. Lance had ended up telling him all about his time at the Garrison and for the first time his stupid rivalry had made sense. If Keith was in Lance’s position, he’d want to kick his ass too. In return, he gave Lance a blow-by-blow account of how he’d sucker-punched Iverson.

 

Keith had to admit that the ‘chatting’ was new for him. Lance, it seemed, delighted in weaving tales of his sordid affairs involving aliens they’d met across the galaxies. He _almost_ had Keith convinced he was some kind of space Casanova before Pidge had had the kindness of heart to tell him that it was all a load of shit. Lance had sulked for days.

 

However, in exchange for listening to whatever half-witted, half-formed thoughts that drifted across Lance’s mind, Keith gained a sparring partner. It wasn’t that Shiro wasn’t great… it was just more of an ego boost to be repeatedly pinning Lance to the ground than spending two or three vargas being flung around the room with Shiro’s winter soldier arm.

  


It was during one of these sessions that Allura entered, a frown set deep into her forehead.

“Sorry to interrupt but we have landed on Voccaucarro and the Omi have refused to speak about an alliance unless Lance is there.”

Keith reluctantly let go of Lance’s wrists so that the boy could sit up. Judging by his clueless expression Lance appeared to know just as much as _he_ did about the ‘Omi’.

“What?”

Allura huffed,

“The Omi. We saved their capital from a Galra attack some phoebs ago, don’t you remember?”

 

Lance shook his head slowly. Keith couldn’t really blame him - they met a lot of aliens with funky names.

“Their prince. The High Prince of the Omicron Asteropaios galaxy. Ruler of the Hemithea formation and Emperor of the twenty three Eridani star systems.”

Lance’s face remained blank. Allura exhaled through gritted teeth.

“You called him….. Inky.”

“Ohhhh, Inky. Of course. Yeah, I’ll come.”

  


______________________________________________________________________________

  
  


Lance had met Inky at the end of the paladin’s fight against the Galra. The team had separated and as usual, collected their fair share of bumps, bruises, and light concussions. Lance, in his typical heroic fashion, had been doing great until he tripped over a space rock and rolled his ankle. If it wasn’t for Shiro’s ‘ _no swearing on the Comms’_ rule, he would have outcursed Pidge. It really fucking hurt. Unfortunately, before he’d had the chance to inform the rest of the team a shadow fell across him.

  


“Who are you?”

That was a lot of teeth. Sharp, sharp teeth. Lance was suddenly experiencing a lot of prey instincts he’d never had to deal with before.

“The name’s Lance.”  
His voice pitched nervously up at the end. The creature’s eyes flashed amber,

“Is Lancy hurt?”

 

Lance weighed up his options; he could easily make it back to the others by himself with a bit of wincing…. But on the other hand, the brave alien offering to help him was eight feet of rippling muscle and Lance was _weak_.

“I think I’ve hurt my ankle. Could you take me to the city central please?”

He batted his eyelashes provocatively in case that helped; through trial and error they’d found out there were some fairly universal hand gestures throughout the galaxy. Keith’s mistake, not his.

 

The alien looked troubled.

“I am most sorry Lancy. I am named-”

They made a throbbing noise that Lance’s universal translator didn’t even bother trying to interpret.

“Wowee, that’s a beautiful name but could I call you, uh-”

Lance took in the aliens thick dark hide, mottled with barbs.

“Inky?”

A thick purr rumbled in the alien’s chest. That seemed to have gone down well.

 

Inky bent down and lifted Lance with ease. Not unrelated to this, Lance’s pulse skyrocketed. What could he say? He liked someone that could throw him around.

 

Without warning, Inky took off running. Later, Lance could have sworn he heard a sonic boom and mere seconds after the sound, they entered a towering violet building deep in the heart of the alien city.

 

Casting a sweeping gaze along the ornately decorated hall, Lance was alarmed to see the whole team standing there amongst hundreds of Omi.

“Lance,” said Allura, eyes glinting like steel,

“It’s an honour to have you joining us half a varga after the agreed time.”

Okay, that one was on him; he really needed to pay more attention during briefings. He removed his helmet under the heavy stare of Allura and waited for Inky to set him down. They didn’t.

 

Instead Inky crossed the length of the hall, seating themself on a large, elaborately carved chair and moving Lance onto his lap. That was fine, he could just tell Shiro he’d made a strong personal alliance with them. He caught eyes with Shiro across the chamber. It was not fine.

  


The remainder of the mission turned out to be a bust anyway. Apparently the Omi were in the process of changing rulers and they weren’t allowed to make any political decisions during that time. After returning to the Castle, Shiro gave Lance another mandatory, _‘Don’t fuck aliens’_ talk that they both knew he wasn’t going to listen to and Allura chewed him out for not showing up on time.

 

So, yeah. Lance remembered Inky.

  
  
  


“This is an important alliance for us.”

Allura continued, “The Omi are a skilled race of healers with advanced information and technology in medicine. Having them on our side would give us a huge advantage.”

Lance found that difficult to believe. He could remember seeing a lot of claws, spikes, and teeth… and an underwhelming absence of stethoscopes.

“Healers, really?”

 

Allura gave him a look she reserved only for him,

“Yes, of course. Their bodies are built for healing; their spicula carry multiple medicinal values and even their skin secretes a weak anesthetic. It has aphrodisiac like properties when in close contact with others, did you really not notice?”

 

Lance could feel the blood rushing to his face.

“Nope. I was not attracted to Inky at all.”

 

“Yes, we all believe that.”

Pidge walked in, smirk in place. She should really have an evil theme song, Lance thought bitterly. Hunk followed in behind her and Lance shot his friend a desperate look.

“Huuuuunk, back me up here.”

 

“You told me he had ‘ _muscle tiddies bigger than Shiro’s_ ’ and spent three weeks begging for a comparative analysis.”

Pidge made a noise somewhere between a cackle and a hoot whilst Hunk’s traitor self gave Lance an unapologetic shrug. Lance stalked past both of them, flicking his middle finger up at Pidge.

 

_Traitors._

  


______________________________________________________________________________

  
  
  


Keith wished he could have joined in with the others, teasing Lance, but his mind was racing.

 

Healers.

 

A planet full of healers.

 

This was his chance. To fix what he’d done back then. The guilt of it had been weighing down on him for months and although neither of them were willing to bring it up, it cast a shadow across his and Lance’s newly formed friendship.

 

Ever since Lance had left the pod, he’d spent night after night trying to pull the scarred words onto his own body. The effort was in vain and Keith had been terrified that he’d neverbe able to bridge the gap between him and the blue paladin. And yet here they were; apparently landing on the planetary equivalent of Holby City.

 

Keith knew he couldn’t take back what he’d done, hell, Lance might not even want to get rid of it - for whatever reasons - but Keith _had_ to give him the choice.

  


With his mind made up, Keith followed Allura and the others out of the Castle and into the Omi city of Orsier where the alliance was to be discussed. Shiro, Allura, and Lance made their way towards a violet, domed building whilst he, Pidge and Hunk travelled deeper into the city. As Pidge had said, _‘We’re on an alien planet. Why would we pick going to a meeting over exploring?’_

  


He slipped away from Pidge and Hunk as quickly as he could, disappearing into the thick crowd. The city seemed to have been plucked straight from Keith’s nightmares. There were Omi everywhere. Talking in gravelly voices, pushing and pulling in a never ending flow of noise and movement. It was overwhelming. He ended up squeezing his way past several soft looking, lilac coloured buildings in order to find a less populated street.

 

Then came his next challenge. How was he supposed to find a healer? Buildings in various shades of violet towered above him with no visible entrances or exits. After several frustrating minutes, Keith gave a mental ‘ _fuck it_ ,’ summoned up his courage and asked an eight foot Omi for directions.

 

The Omi cocked their head at him.

“Come. follow me.”

They led him down several more alleyways before they arrived in front of a lavender building that looked like every other fucking building he’d passed in the last half varga! Still, he thanked the Omi, who gave him an odd half bow before shambling off.

 

Unsure what else he was supposed to do, Keith pressed his hand against the wall. To his surprise, it parted away easily and he fell forward, the soft fronds of the building brushing against his body. It was like a huge solid wall of sand. Except it wasn’t, because sand wouldn’t have replaced itself behind him after he went through so the simile didn’t work, and there was no point in comparing it to sand at all.

 

After dusting himself off, he spotted an Omi on the other side of the ‘shop’ immediately. Their skin was a paler colour than any of the other Omi he’d seen before and he was unsure whether to liken it to old age or sickness. Opaque spheres hung from the ceiling, colours swirling around their insides like multicoloured storms. The Omi stared at him unblinking. Keith cleared his throat,

“I’m looking for a medicine. I was told to come here…”

He trailed off.

 

The Omi observed him for a while, making quiet chitters of contemplation before finally speaking.

“What is it you are looking for?”  
“Something to heal skin. Um, to heal scarring.”

The Omi nodded, then pulled a thick green cuff from deep within the robe-like clothing they wore. It was easily three or four sizes larger than Keith’s wrist.

 

“I need a species DNA sample.”

They sounded impatient. Keith cautiously threaded his arm through the cuff and waited as it made a jaunty humming sound. Without fanfare the cuffs’ colour faded into a deep red, the Omi barely glancing at it before scurrying around the shop; collecting various spheres and mixing their contents. Soon after, Keith was handed a sphere slightly smaller than his clenched fist, with a churning ruby tempest twisting through its center.

 

“Break the shell and let the cloud smooth across the injury. Scars are old wounds, it will take a lot of energy to heal. Your species must sleep to rejuvenate.”

Keith nodded.

“Your payment now.”

Ah, right. Keith fumbled with the pocket at his hip, earlier he’d shoved a whole lot of GAC in there; uncertain of how much medicine would cost. He gave it all to the Omi, not particularly caring about change.

  
“No.”

No?

“I need _that_ as my payment.”

They pointed to Keith’s other hip, where his Marmoran blade hung. He shook his head,

“Sorry, I can’t give you that. It’s very important to me. If you want more GAC I can bring you some.”  
Once again the Omi shook their head.

“I do not need GAC. I will only accept the blade.”

The decision hung in his mind for a split second. Then without pause, he pulled the knife from its sheath and thrust it towards the Omi, handle first.

 

It hurt more than he thought it would, to give up his mother’s dagger. It had been a part of him for so long. His hip felt light with its departure, leaving the rest of his body unbalanced. Yet he couldn’t find it within himself to regret it. He owed this to Lance.

  


To his confusion, the Omi offered the knife back.

“Your GAC will cover the payment. I was simply testing your loyalty, red paladin. A soulmate is a dangerous thing.”

 

They rolled up a flowing sleeve, revealing a winding bone-white spiral that seemed to curve up the entirety of their body. Keith could see tendrils of the colour stretch across their hands and realised that the curve of white across their cheek was just a continuation of the mark. The Omi dropped their sleeve to cover their arm once again,

“Sometimes two people are better kept apart.”

There was an aged note of pain in their voice that even the translators managed to pick up on. Keith nodded at them, his mouth dry.

“Now go.”

The Omi hustled him back out onto the street, the roar of the crowd a stark contrast to the quiet tranquility of the shop.

“Good luck red paladin.”

  


He followed the electronic map that Pidge had sent to all of them, making his way back to the Castle ship. It would be a few vargas before Lance returned but he needed some time to psych himself up. This was going to be hard.

  
  
  


He caught them just as they were entering the Castle.

“Keith! Where have you been? Why did you go off without us?”

Keith ignored Hunk.

“Lance, meet me in my room.”

He didn’t wait around to see Lance’s reaction, trusting the paladin would be able to tell he was being serious.

 

He sat on his bed, waiting for Lance to arrive, running over what he was going to say in his head. When he heard the sound of his door opening, he didn’t look up, knowing he would lose his nerve if he did.

 

“Lance. I know we’ve already done this and we wanted to put all of it behind us. But I can’t. And I don’t think you can either. I hurt you. I- those scars on your arms were because of me and- shit I’m so sorry. I can’t say it enough but I really am.”

He raised his hand, which held the smoky sphere.

“This is a medicine from the Omi, it will heal your arms. Uh, you don’t _have_ to take it. I wouldn’t force you. But you deserve to have a choice.”

Lance didn’t speak and Keith couldn’t work up the courage to look at him.

 

“You shouldn’t have had to live with that. I’m sorry-”

He felt a dip in the bed beside him and quickly lifted his head from his hands. Lance gazed back at him, eyes swimming with tears.

 

_Shit_ , why was he crying again? How could one person cry so much? He’d seen Lance cry more than the rest of the team put together. He just didn’t understand it. He thought Lance would have appreciated having a choice. Had Keith done something wrong?

 

“Thank you.”  
Lance’s voice was softer than Keith had ever heard before.

“Thank you so much.”

Lance’s fingers briefly danced across the glassy surface before he withdrew them.

“Could you put it on? My hands are shaking too much.”

Keith could see that. He decided not to tell Lance that his own hands were shaking just as badly. He waited for Lance to pull off his jacket then dug his nails into the sphere, easily pulling it apart. The green substance inside trickled out like gel, smelling sweeter than Keith had expected.

 

He smoothed the gel across both of Lance’s arms, the scent of it oddly relaxing. After a couple of minutes, Lance started to lean further back into the bed, yawning. Keith almost panicked, but the Omi had said something like that would happen.

 

In an uncharacteristic act of affection, he leaned forward to pull a space pillow under Lance’s head. However, before he could move back, Lance tugged at his shirt. He paused to look down at the blue paladin who suddenly lifted himself up to brush his lips against Keith’s.

“Thanks mullet.”

With a self-satisfied smile curling at his lips, Lance’s eyes fluttered shut.

 

Keith didn’t move from where he was sitting, feeling the rush of blood to his face. He watched as Lance made himself comfortable in his bed - twisting over in his sleep until he somewhat resembled a burrito. When he was finally happy with his position he let out a pleased little humming noise. Keith felt the blush in his face deepen. This was bad. This was really really bad.

 

There was a cute boy asleep in his bed and Keith was going to have some problems.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> and we're drawing to a close my folks. I believe there will be one more chapter after this and then we're done :'(


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It was an honour flying with you guys.
> 
> Thought I should finish this fic before season 8 finishes me.

Lance woke up slowly. That wasn’t exactly an unnatural occurrence for him - he wasn’t like Shiro or Keith, leaping out of bed as if consciousness owed them something. Or Pidge who instead of going to bed like a normal person, just fell asleep halfway through whatever she was doing.

 

In fairness, he’d never actually seen the Alteans sleeping but he could guarantee that they slept like bats, or sleep-danced or did _something_ weird and alieny. If he didn’t have Hunk, he wouldn’t have known what to do. Hunk, at least, understood. You had to wake up slowly. To gently ease yourself out of the heavy fog of sleep- and Keith was on the floor.

 

Lance paused mid-stretch, eyeballing the red paladin. The guy even slept like a heathen, limbs spread-eagled and mouth hanging open. Lance turned his head to the side to see the considerable amount of bed surrounding him and felt a lump of guilt settle itself into his stomach. He willed it away - Keith didn’t _have_ to sleep on the floor, there had been space. He could have easily slept on the bed.

 

With Lance.

 

After Lance kissed him.

 

Echoes of the previous night flickered through his head. Yes, that was something he had done. Lance probed the memory, testing it out. He’d been close to sleep, the Omi medicine fogging up his mind, and there had been Keith, leaning over him, taking care of him. Freaky alien medicine or not, Lance had wanted to kiss that boy.

 

And apparently, he had.

  
  


Bracing hard on his arms, he pulled himself up into a sitting position. Jesus, his arms felt like lead. Slightly afraid of what he was going to find, he looked down at them. Sometime during the night the sphere mumbo juice had hardened, leaving both of his forearms encased inside a thick, translucent, crystal.

 

Testing their strength, he knocked them against one another. To his surprise, they crumbled without any resistance, spilling an avalanche of dust into his lap. Lance sent a silent apology to Keith and his bed, checking the boy was still asleep.

 

Now that whatever crystal substance was gone, his arms felt weirdly light. He rotated his wrists, hoping he hadn’t accidentally contracted some rare Omi death illness.

  
  


It was the smoothness that caught his eye.

 

Some folks liked to use the expression, _‘I know it like the back of my hand’_ Lance had personally never understood that phrase. The bruises and scrapes that decorated his skin changed as easily as the tide, their rise and fall unmappable and erratic. If the expression was instead, _‘I knew it like the scars on my wrist’_ Lance could agree with it wholeheartedly, able to picture every curve and slash of the marked letters perfectly; and didn’t that sound edgy?

 

The point still stood that for years Lance had grown used to seeing the scars across his arms, and as a result found seeing his skin as unspoiled as the day he was born a bit jarring. He angled his arms in the light, checking every angle. Unmarked. Unblemished.

 

The magic goop had even gone the extra mile and removed a smallish mole that had once lurked inside his left inner wrist. Lance wasn’t exactly sure how he felt about that last part; but to get rid of the marks, the  _branding_ he’d held across his skin for so many years. He felt free. Lance gave a tiny, high-pitched whoop into the pillow, not wanting to wake up Keith.

 

The paladin stirred anyway, jumping to his feet before he’d even opened his eyes. _Disgusting_. Keith leaned across the bed, fingers dancing across the covers as if he didn’t dare to touch Lance’s skin.

“Are you okay? Did it hurt? Did it _work_?”

Lance giggled, still flying high, and flipped over his arms so Keith could see for himself.

 

Keith let out an enthusiastic yell and caught up in a rush of gratitude, Lance surged forward to wrap his arms around the boy. Unfortunately he was still very much one with the blanket and the two were sent crashing to the floor.

 

Lance’s nose throbbed from where it had collided harshly with Keith’s forehead. He’d always said Keith was hardheaded. Keith lay on top of him, arms bracketing the sides of his head, face only inches away from Lance’s. The red paladin’s breaths fanned across his face, mocking him, as Lance found his own had been taken away. Once again, his memories of the previous night resurfaced and from the look on Keith’s face, he was thinking the same.

 

They stayed briefly trapped in the moment before Lance not-so-gracefully wriggled his way out of Keith’s personal space, rolling out underneath his arms.

“Thank you for the, uh, slime.” He fiddled with a string on his jacket self consciously, ducking his head. Keith waved a hand awkwardly, as if to physically waft the statement away,

“It’s fine, I owed you.”

 

There was a pause.

 

Lance took the time to look at Keith. _No, not like that._ They’d been through a lot together. Soulmate shenanigans asides, piloting a giant cat robot creature as the universe’s last stand against a tyrannical dictatorship of furry, purple aliens that had ruled the cosmos for the past ten thousand years had the tendency to bring people together. Especially during the last few months, Lance had grown to appreciate that. Keith had his back, he could trust him. And he was (somewhat) mature enough to admit that he genuinely liked the boy. Sure he admired Keith’s drive and determination, (even if it often wavered into obstinacy), but he also valued Keith as a friend. He liked competing with him over nothing. He liked training with him for hours, even if close-range fighting wasn’t something he excelled in. He liked the little moments between them; the in-jokes, the shared smiles, the way that Keith would always look at Lance for support. That he knew Lance would always back him up.

 

Lance looked at Keith and the realisation swept across him like a tidal wave. He could have laughed. His nickname was loverboy but he had somehow failed to realise that he’d been falling in love with Keith for a long time.

 

In addition to this sudden realisation, Lance also took the time to admire the tight undershirt Keith was wearing. He was only human after all.

  
  


He looked at Keith and Keith looked at him and a voice in his head that sounded suspiciously like Pidge’s said, _‘fuck it’_ and with no plan for what he was doing whatsoever, Lance opened his mouth,

“I kissed you last night.”

Keith’s mouth flapped open and closed a couple of times,

“Yeah, you did.”

“And I wanted to- to kiss you, I-”

Lance closed his eyes and took the plunge,

“I like you.”

 

It took half a second of silence before he spoke again because Lance knew Keith and Keith was an idiot, so hastily he added,

“This isn’t because we’re soulmates. Obviously. That has _so obviously_ not worked for us.”

Keith nodded in understanding. Lance had a point.

“But I do. I do _like you_.”   
Lance really had to get the point across. Keith could be a bit slow. He watched as reactions played out across Keith’s face. He could practically see the cogs turning in the boy’s head, bless him - it must be hard to think under all that mullet. Finally he seemed to reach a verdict, looking up at Lance.

 

“Same.”

Keith smiled at him sincerely, somehow confident in the wooing ability of his reply. Lance was decidedly un-wooed.

 

He looked at the red paladin in disbelief, but was taken aback by the open, honest look on the boy’s face. That genuine affection in his expression said more to Lance than any words Keith would have stumbled over.

  
  


Now, at this point many people might have told Lance _‘Don’t push your luck,’_ or _‘Quit while you’re ahead,’_ or some other bullshit idiom that would only encourage mediocrity. However, if any one of those people _knew_ Lance, they would know that Lance never quits. And he’s never that far ahead to begin with.

 

“Could you- would- do you want to _kiss me_?”

Lance stammered, shyly. Just because he’d decided to do something, didn’t mean he knew _what_ he was doing.

 

In the brief pause it took for the words to make their way through Keith’s head, Lance had created an entire plan B that revolved around ejecting himself out of the Castle. Then Keith tackled him.

 

They fell in a tangle of limbs, crashing into Keith’s bed, but Lance was hardly aware of that, too preoccupied with the fact that Keith was kissing him. It was horrible. Their teeth clacked and Keith bit Lance’s lip hard enough to draw blood, and in all honesty Lance would have hated it if it wasn’t for the fact that Keith was holding him like he was afraid to let go.

He tasted like the tooth cubes Lance had come to associate with cleanliness- Side Note - Lance fucking hated the tooth cubes. They were bubblegum pink, about the size of a dice and tasted like a mix between the feeling you get when you wear a new pair of shoes for the first time but it turns out you had a test that day that you didn’t revise for, and apricot. Coran gave them to the team monthly, assuring them that _‘These will keep your breath fresh and your exposed bones strong and healthy’_ but they were just _wrong_. Hunk had been working on something that would closer resemble toothpaste but he’d kept being interrupted by the, uh, war they were currently in the middle of.

Keith’s tongue felt rougher than it should have - huh, Galra genes - and he was relying on enthusiasm more than actual technique, but, Lance thought with a smile, he made the tooth cubes taste good.

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


Their relationship developed slowly during the following months. Lance didn’t want to mess anything up and presumably, neither did Keith. In some ways nothing had changed between them; they were still fiercely competitive, Keith was still _really_ hot, and Lance still loved being around him. Of course, they were also still in the midst of a war, so their relationship had to take the backbench but they made it work.

Voltron had never been so powerful; together they worked those ancient mechanics like it was Zumba class in the old folks home, the bond between them all stronger than ever.

Well, their Voltron bond was stronger than ever, neither of them had touched their soulmate bond since Keith had saved him back on the unknown planet.

 

Lance knew it was a touchy subject considering, uh, _everything_ , but communication was their thing now. If Keith said Lance sitting in his lap all the time was annoying, Lance would explain that the reason he was sitting in Keith’s lap all the time was _to be_ annoying.

 

The soulmate bond, however, was a difficult thing to bring up. The two of them had a lot of bad history surrounding it and frankly, it might be better for the both of them if they just never spoke about it or used it again. They didn’t have to be soulmates.

But a small, selfish part of Lance didn’t care about that at all. He wanted to take Keith’s pain away, he wanted to be Keith’s soulmate, he wanted to do it to show Keith how much he loved him.

 

He just didn’t know how to tell him all that.

  
  


Luckily for Lance the sexy coward, he was practically handed an opportunity to get those feelings out into the open.

  
  


Almost six months after their confession, Lance wandered into Keith’s room to find the paladin bandaging bruised and split knuckles.

“Keith, what happened?!”

Keith looked up, almost guiltily,

“I, _ahem_ , punched the training bot.”   
“You what?”

“It knocked my sword away and I got mad and I punched it.”  
Lance snorted,

“Did you win?”  
Keith shook his head, sulking. Lance was pretty sure he was more upset about losing the fight than he was about the injuries to his hand.

 

He took the aforementioned hand into his own, grimacing at the callouses. How could Keith not understand how gross that was?! Ignoring that long-standing argument, he steeled himself to ask a question that had been burdening his mind for weeks.

“Can I take that pain from you?”

His voice was small and he didn’t dare to look Keith in the eye.

“I don’t want to take it ‘cause you’re my soulmate. I want to take it because you’re my Keith and I don’t like you getting hurt.”  
His throat felt tight and Lance was one hundred percent sure that if Keith rejected him he would burst into tears.

 

His head shot up at the sound of Keith’s gruff chuckle, the red paladin grinning in amusement.

“You’re such a dork, _‘you are my Keith’_ ”

Lance felt a heat rise in his cheeks and would have retorted in turn if he couldn’t see the same colour darken the other boy’s ears.

“So, can I?”

Keith nodded, trust in his eyes and Lance had to appreciate how far the two of them had come to be in this position. They’d had to go through a lot of shit and Lance had no doubt that there’d be more to come. But now, right now, Lance didn’t think he could possibly be happier.

  
  
  


Lance was seven the first time his mama told him about soulmates, but it took a heck of a long time for him to understand what a soulmate was.

 

But Keith, mullety, thick-headed, impulsive, passionate, caring, dumbass Keith. As far as Lance was concerned, that was what _his_ soulmate was.

  
  
  


______________________________________________________________________________

  
  
  
  


Keith felt the pain in his hand ebb away as Lance brought it onto his own body. It felt different than it had when he was a child. He wasn’t panicked at the loss of control, instead the pleasant buzzing across his hand felt gentle and protective.

 

Lance wrinkled his nose in discomfort as the skin across his knuckles bloomed with bruising.

“Jesus Keith, we need to work on your self control.”

Guilt squirmed in Keith’s stomach,

“I’m sorry-”

Lance cut him off before he could continue, dispelling the negativity of his thoughts as quickly as he had the pain.

“No, don’t you dare go feeling guilty. I took this pain because I like you and I don’t want to see you hurt and that was my choice and I don’t regret it. Also, you never disinfect your cuts and it really bugs me.”

He gave Keith a blinding smile and the red paladin felt his heart swell.

  
  


Keith couldn’t believe he had thought he’d known what a soulmate was all those years ago. With the arrogance of a child he assumed he knew everything the word had to offer, but had never truly understood. Not until now; holding this brilliant, beautiful, blinding boy that made him happy and took his pain away because he loved him.

  
  


Lance gasped, breaking him out of his thoughts.

“Oh shit, I was meant to tell you Pidge finished working on the, uh, purple electric thingy, and she wanted you to check it out, it’s-”  


Keith kissed him, a bruising affection that Lance immediately melted into. He wrapped his arms around the blue paladin, if only to keep him closer for a little longer. Keith broke the kiss, resting his forehead against Lance’s as they both panted for air. Smiling softly, he pulled at the flustered boy’s hand, leading him towards the door.

“Come on, let's go see what Pidge wants.”

Lance huffed,

“You’re an asshole.”

Keith only laughed in response.

  


No, this was what a soulmate was and Zarkon had better start running because Keith would tear this universe apart before he let anything happen to _his_ soulmate.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Canon can suck my ass
> 
> none of that Lotor, Haggar, the Earth got blown up shit.
> 
>  
> 
> And this is it. I honestly can’t believe I’ve finished this, it’s the longest goddam thing I’ve ever written and I’m stupidly proud of it :)
> 
> Avert your eyes if you wish to imagine I keep up my cool persona forever but…
> 
> Thanks so much to all the people that have been reading this chapter-by-chapter and commenting and kudos etc. It really means a lot to me and I never expected for "the internet" to be so hecking lovely.
> 
> Once again, thank you for the support and let's hope that season 8 doesn’t fuck us over to badly.
> 
> See y'all around!!

**Author's Note:**

> Whoo, you made it! Thanks for reading! New chapters soon, promise.
> 
> Just a note for Altean time measurements:  
> Varga - Hour  
> Tick - Second  
> Quintant - Day  
> Movement - Week  
> Phoeb - Month  
> Dobosh - Minute  
> Deca-Phoeb - Year


End file.
